


Exiles

by nwhepcat



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Supernatural
Genre: AU, Angst, Crossover, Episode: s03e11 Mystery Spot, F/M, Mystery Spot!Sam
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-05
Updated: 2009-12-05
Packaged: 2017-10-04 04:32:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 30,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nwhepcat/pseuds/nwhepcat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Living a loner's life near Death Valley, Oz meets someone even more cut off from other people than he is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Exiles

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my LJ readers for reading, encouraging, and generally being wonderful.
> 
> Disclaimer: Neither Sam nor Oz nor their not entirely meshable worlds are mine, more's the pity. Alice is mine, and I love her to pieces.

Oz drowses in the laundromat, lulled by the sound of dryers and the sun pouring in the plate glass window. He's sitting on the deep ledge of the window, amid piles of freebie newspapers, religious tracts and flyers for weight loss systems and computer classes. It's early Sunday morning, his favorite time to do his laundry, since few people are around at this hour, for the most part. The religious ones are getting ready for church, and the heathens are sleeping off Saturday night. Apparently there aren't that many in the middle. A bored man reads yesterday's paper in one of the plastic chairs in the back, while the owner works on her coffee and a magazine.

 

 

The door opens, letting in the July heat and a smell that cuts through his drowsiness.

 

 

Blood. Lots of it. And it's not all human. And not exactly animal, either.

 

 

Oz goes very still, trying to hold his inner wolf in check. He opens one eye a slit and sees a tall, shaggy-haired guy in an army jacket with a duffle bag slung over his shoulder. Depositing the bag on one washer, he begins stuffing his laundry in a couple of machines.

 

 

Grabbing the paperback he'd abandoned on the platform next to him, Oz shifts so that he can watch the guy while seeming to stare idly into space. He's got to admire the guy's efficiency. Of course he's presorted -- he places a tight wad of clothes into each machine without Oz catching sight of any blood at all. The guy wipes his hands on a dark tee shirt before flipping the washer doors shut and heading for the change machine, where he feeds in a bill and gets a cascade of quarters.

 

 

Oz takes note of the way the guy moves -- carefully, favoring his left leg and his side. Bruised ribs, he'd guess. He's not sure about the near limp. His wolf sits up and takes an interest, and Oz hauls him back sharply.

 

 

The blood smell almost disappears behind the washer doors, and once the machines start filling with water, it fades completely. The guy starts to straighten, but pauses, a hand going to his ribs. His face pales. After a second or two he manages to unfold himself, though he's still got one hand at his side, the other on one of the machines for support.

 

 

Just as Oz thinks he should offer some kind of assistance, the guy looks back toward the row of scarred orange plastic seats and its lone occupant, then where Oz is stationed. He notes Oz's attention and his eyes narrow with a distinctly _fuck you_ flavor. He pulls a book out of the pocket of his duffel and stalks out into the stifling heat, parking himself in the plastic chair by the door.

 

 

Solitary. Likes it that way. "Hard as nails " doesn't begin to cover it -- even Oz's wolf felt that _fuck you_. Oz makes him for his mid-twenties at most, yet there's something about him that feels ancient.

 

 

And what does it say about Oz's life that he feels he's gotten to know more about this guy in three minutes than he's learned about anyone in the past two years?

 

 

***

 

 

Oz returns to his paperback while he waits for his dryer. Now that his wolf has awakened, there's no more drowsing in the window.

 

 

The first full moon night of the month is still 36 hours away, but ever since the Initiative got Oz, the wolf is never completely dormant. It only comes out on the full moon, but he's often aware of it, watching.

 

 

Once his dryer stops, Oz dumps his clothes out onto the chipped Formica table and begins to fold them. He's always liked the Zen of this task: the warmth and fresh smell of clean clothes, the repetitive motion of shaking out a garment, folding it once, twice, three times, maybe four. It soothes him and focuses his mind at the same time. But this time the routine doesn't settle him. The smell of blood is too recent; his wolf paces its cage.

 

 

Apart from that, Oz is abruptly aware of the parallels between himself and the stranger. Every piece of clothing he owns fits into one washer, one dryer. Gradually he's whittled things down so all his t-shirts and button-downs are in the same color range, which can mingle with his jeans in the wash without one fading on the other. He shoves his gray boxer briefs in the same load. It's efficient and saves the pittance he makes as a dish washer in the diner across the street, but he's aware of the kind of life this efficiency reveals.

 

 

As he folds Oz studies the tall stranger through the front window. An early attempt at reading his book has been abandoned, and now the guy observes what little action is going on out on the street: a slow-moving hound looking for shade, a car of churchgoers.

 

 

Oz's wolf watches too. He takes in the subtle changes in the stranger's bearing, indications that the heat or his injuries are taking a toll. When the guy rises from his chair, Oz and his wolf are so zeroed in on him that what happens next seems to occur in slow motion. The stranger's movements have none of the tight control Oz had noticed earlier. He staggers a bit, putting a hand out blindly to steady himself against the storefront, then he goes down hard.

 

 

***

 

 

Oz tosses the t-shirt he's folding aside and hurries to the sidewalk. If anything, it feels like the temperature has risen another fifteen degrees since he first arrived. He crouches by the tall guy, who's sprawled on the concrete, out cold.

 

 

The coppery tang of blood reaches Oz again, fainter than before, this time from abrasions on the stranger's face and hand from his fall.

 

 

"Oh hell," says a smoky voice from the laundromat doorway. It's Alice, the owner. _Oh hell_ is her initial response to any crisis, whether it's an empty change machine or a dryer that's shooting out flames. "Think I should call the rescue squad?"

 

 

"I don't know," Oz says. "He seems like the kind of guy who'd rather fly under the radar."

 

 

She gets that. Not only because a lot of her business depends on the same kind of guy, but because she has a healthy distrust of authority herself. Alice had been reluctant to call 911 even when the flames were erupting from the dryer. "Okay, what do we do?"

 

 

He wonders if he's about to offer up the stupidest plan of all time. "We could take him to my place. Let him rest while I finish up his laundry and mine, then figure out where to go from there."

 

 

Alice gives him a long look. It's not that she doesn't trust him -- he rents the rooms behind the laundromat building and does the occasional repair work or maintenance for her. He's sure she's figured him for an under-the-radar kind of guy himself. "You sure?"

 

 

"Not especially. But what's the worst that can happen? He steals all my stuff? Eighty percent of it is on the folding table."

 

 

She eyes the unconscious guy and then Oz. "You're going to need help."

 

 

"I think you're right."

 

 

Alice hoists the guy to his feet, with some small amount of help from Oz. She's almost as tall as the stranger, with a similar build, except not as muscled. Oz doesn't know much of her story, except she used to be a guy. He often wonders, usually at odd moments like this one, why she chose an old fashioned name like Alice when she's fond of black nail polish and blue-black hair dye and miniskirts with leggings and a wardrobe of different colored cowboy boots. Today's shade is teal.

 

 

"I've got him," she says. "Go on ahead and get the door."

 

 

Oz heads down the narrow alley to his little courtyard with its few carefully tended container plantings and a chair where he sometimes plays guitar at night. He unlocks his door and pushes it open, then heads back to help Alice with his houseguest.

 

 

As she shifts her hold on the stranger, she draws in a sharp breath. "Daniel. You should rethink this." He's never heard her sound _alarmed_ before.

 

 

"What?"

 

 

"He's got a gun tucked in his waistband."

 

_Oh hell._

 

 

***

 

 

Oz flicks a look at the tall guy, who's still out cold, propped up by Alice. He raises the guy's shirt tail and lifts the gun off him, ejecting the magazine from the grip. He tucks the pistol in his own waistband, ejects the round that's chambered and slips the bullet and magazine into his pocket. "Now he doesn't."

 

 

"Which means he'll be pissed off when he wakes up. Seriously, Daniel. I don't like this. You're taking a big chance."

 

 

"Someone took a chance on me once."

 

 

She shoots him a look. "You didn't have a weapon."

 

 

But he did -- claws and teeth and a wolf he couldn't entirely control. He disappears into the desert every full moon, but when he'd first come here the wolf didn't always confine himself to three nights a month. "Trust me on this," he says. "I have pretty good instincts."

 

 

Alice scowls but shifts her hold on the stranger. Oz moves to help support him as they take him into Oz's apartment and ease him onto the bed. "I don't know," she says. "If this is heatstroke or something, he needs to go to the emergency room."

 

 

Oz shakes his head. "He's injured. I noticed when he came in. I was thinking maybe bruised ribs, but now I wonder if they're broken." He hauls his first aid kit out of his closet and sets it on the bedside stand that holds his alarm clock and whatever he's reading lately.

 

 

"That's a pretty damn big first aid kit for a little shaver like you." She gives him a long, appraising look, and Oz suspects she's remembering a time or two when he returned from a full moon walkabout considerably worse for wear. She lets the silence stretch out, but Oz is comfortable with silence. "First rule of fight club," she finally says, but it still doesn't get a rise from him. "You're going to try to fix him?"

 

 

"Not while he's out. He comes to, and it's probably a short route to me getting hurt. I'll just leave a note saying where he is and where his stuff is." He scrawls a note to that effect as Alice asks if she can get a glass of water.

 

 

She sets the glass next to Oz's note, and scrawls _P.S. HYDRATE!!_ at the bottom, and then accompanies Oz back to the laundromat. The tall guy's washers have stopped running, so Oz transfers everything to the dryers across the room. Alice refuses to let him use his own quarters.

 

 

Oz buys them both a soda from the Coke machine in the back, then passes up his half-finished pile of folding to take a look out on the street. There's a big black hulk of a car parked across the street. Oz has seen parade floats smaller than that.

 

 

"Think it's his?" Alice asks from beside him.

 

 

"I might bet on that." He pushes the door open and crosses the deserted street to have a better look, and Alice comes along.

 

 

"I don't know if it's a classic," she says, "but it's old."

 

 

Not much sign inside of a life lived on the road, but the driver's seat is pushed back as far as it will go, which just might accommodate the stranger's long legs.

 

 

Oz exchanges a look with Alice.

 

 

"I've never seen it before," she tells him, "and this is my view all day, every day."

 

 

For the first time he wonders why she does spend her days in here, with her limited view, and how she got here.

 

 

Catching sight of something on the passenger side floorboard, Oz cranes for a closer look. Could be a book of some kind.

 

 

"I'm not going to start snooping now," Alice says, and briefly Oz wonders if it's a pointed comment because she somehow realized he was entertaining questions about her.

 

 

Meeting her gaze, he nods and they head back toward the laundromat. Oz bends to pick up the battered paperback the stranger dropped when he fell. Jim Thompson, _Savage Night_. "Creepy," he says. The main thing he knows about Jim Thompson is _The Killer Inside Me_.

 

 

Alice glances at the book, twitches her shapely mouth. "Are you sure about this?" she asks again.

 

 

"Not especially," he says again.

 

 

"Give me the gun, at least. I'll put it in the safe." He follows her to the cramped office in back and hands over the pistol.

 

 

Alice holds it in her palm but doesn't curl her fingers around it. She looks down at it and sighs. "Oh hell. I hate these things."

 

 

***

 

 

Oz tucks the stranger's book back in the duffel pocket and resumes his spot at the folding table. When Alice joins him and shakes out a t-shirt to fold, he isn't sure whether it's because she's decided she likes his company or she's rattled and needs it.

 

 

"Think he's some some kind of criminal?" she asks.

 

 

"Could be. But he could be an undercover cop who ran into trouble." Things are so rarely what they're assumed to be that Oz stopped assuming long ago.

 

 

Alice shoots him a sidelong glance. "Oh, thanks for that, Mr. It Could Always Be Worse."

 

 

Oz can't suppress a grin. "Not a fan, huh?"

 

 

"Long history. And my brother's one, and our father was." Which is the most personal thing she's offered in the two years since he moved here. "There's a certain mindset." She grabs another shapeless wad of knit from Oz's pile, which turns out to be his gray boxer briefs.

 

 

"Oh hey --" He reaches for them.

 

 

"What," she says, amused, "you think I've never touched a pair?" She folds them and adds them to the stack, then reaches for another pair.

 

 

"They're a little ventilated," he admits. He can't remember the last time he bought any new clothes.

 

 

"I actually do see a lot of laundry, you know. And I do the drop-offs. You don't come anywhere near Worst in Show."

 

 

How'd she get here, he wonders again, but that's not a question he's earned the right to ask. For the first time in years, he misses having people in his life who know his story, who trust him with theirs. He tries to think of something even slightly personal he can tell her, because he remembers that's how it begins. But it's like there's some heavy iron door in his head that's rusted shut.

 

 

For the first time in forever he's not so comfortable with silence, but Alice seems not to mind. She helps him fold his things in between dealing with the other customers who've started trickling in, and when the stranger's clothes are dry, she helps fold those, and hauls out a battered laundry basket that someone has brought and left behind.

 

 

"I think you're better off putting his stuff in here than in his duffel bag," she says. "He might not be too happy about the thought of someone opening it up."

 

 

"Good thought," Oz says. He packs the stranger's clothes and puts the duffel on top, then piles his own laundry in a zipped canvas bag on top. "Wish me luck."

 

 

Alice compresses her lips. "I don't like this. Just set the stuff by your door and back the hell away. Don't go back until he's gone."

 

 

"Maybe he needs help." He hoists the plastic basket. "Can you get the door?"

 

 

She glares at him. "Daniel. Don't be an idiot."

 

 

"It'll be all right," Oz says, but he's not thoroughly convinced. He heads for the door, prepared to nudge it open with his hip if he has to.

 

 

Alice heaves another sigh and goes to hold the door for him. "Be careful. Do _not_ make me call 911."

 

 

She's just brimming with good ideas today.

 

 

***

 

 

His wolf is on guard as Oz approaches his apartment door, and Oz lets him have a little slack. He doesn't like walking in blind, but isn't crazy about the notion of knocking and giving his houseguest the upper hand. His wolf picks nothing up, and Oz tries to decide whether that's good or bad. He sets down the laundry basket and braces himself to open the door.

 

 

Oz's bed is unoccupied, the Indian-print spread smoothed and tucked up into hospital corners. The bathroom door is open, the light on, and the tall stranger is studying himself in the mirror. He's got his t-shirt pulled halfway up his chest, and it looks like even that much movement is several notches past painful. The guy's side is a solid mass of bruises, and Oz sees a few black bristles of sutures.

 

 

"Hey," Oz says in greeting.

 

 

Even that puts the stranger on alert. He yanks down the shirt and turns toward Oz, reeling at the sudden movement.

 

 

"Take it easy, you're safe here," Oz says.

 

 

"You have something of mine," the guy says.

 

 

"Your laundry's just outside." That's not what the stranger means, and Oz knows it.

 

 

"That's not all you've got."

 

 

"It's in a safe place." Oz can almost see the thought process that goes through the stranger's head, weighing the intimidating effect of his height against his obvious weakness. Oz's wolf bares its teeth and the stranger seems to decide against attempting to menace him. "Look, I can tend to that if you like." _Like_, he suspects, is a strong word. Though Oz suspects it will go over better than _need_. "I have a fair amount of experience patching people up." Mostly himself, though he has acted as assistant to the occasional missionary or aid worker in his travels.

 

 

"I'm fine, thanks." His hard tone and pallor don't do much for the believability of that sentence. _I'm_ is the only word that rings remotely true.

 

 

"I'll get the laundry," Oz tells him. When he returns he sets the basket down on the bed and unzips his own canvas bag. "You'll need some clean towels." He sets those on the dresser by the bathroom door. Seems safer than trying to hand anything directly to his guest.

 

 

There's a part of Oz that isn't interested in safe. The wolf noses forward, and Oz says casually, "Most of the blood came out, I think. Except one shirt that's pretty much a goner. Demon blood's especially stubborn, wouldn't you say?"

 

 

That punches a hole through the wall surrounding the stranger. His attention focuses, lasering on Oz. "You're a hunter?"

 

 

***

 

 

Oz can barely suppress a laugh. Three nights out of the month, that's a yes. But he knows the type this guy means. He remembers the guy who was on the hunt when Oz first met his wolf, the asshole with the necklace of werewolf fangs. Suddenly it gets a lot less funny.

 

 

Oz says, "Let's just say I'm friends with someone in a related field. I've helped her out from time to time."

 

 

The tough guy mask slips just a bit. "You know Ellen? You know where she is?"

 

 

Oz's wolf scents a complex mix of emotions rolling off the guy. Interesting. For a split second he considers leading him on to see what he can find out, but instinct tells him that would be a dangerous game to play. "No. Sorry. Someone else." He studies the guy. "Is she why you're here?"

 

 

"No. She dropped off the radar a couple of years back." The guy gives his head a shake. "Wait. I guess it was a few months." Again, Oz 's interest level dials up. It doesn't seem like this guy to be so imprecise. The stranger shoots him a sour look, as if it's Oz's fault he's revealed anything personal. "Look, I'll just pack up my stuff and get out of your way as soon as I get the rest of it back." He heads for the bed and his laundry, but the movement involved in lifting his duffel off the top of the laundry basket is enough to make him fold over, his breath hissing with the pain of shifting ribs.

 

 

"Sit," Oz says, as much to his wolf as to the stranger. "Let me take a look and see what I can do."

 

 

The stranger looks at him with near hostility, but clearly realizes he's in no shape to tell Oz to screw off. A cold sweat glistens on his pale face. He eases himself onto the edge of the bed.

 

 

"There's no way I can get that shirt off without it hurting like hell," Oz says, "but I'll do my best."

 

 

"Cut it off, I don't care."

 

 

Nodding, Oz retrieves his scissors from the first aid kit. As he pulls the stretched-out neckline away from the guy's skin, Oz spots a black cord under his shirt.

 

 

His wolf's hackles rise, and he braces himself for the sight of whatever trophies he might find hanging from that cord.

 

 

***

 

 

Oz slices through the stranger's shirt and helps him ease it off. "Let me have a look," he says. Relief gusts from his lungs -- no fangs hanging from the cord, just some sort of amulet.

 

 

The guy misreads him. "Yeah, I know. Looks bad." A mass of bruises extends down his ribcage on the left side and on down past the waist of his jeans. There are places where the skin is cut or torn, the worst of which have been sewn with black thread. Over his heart is a crude tattoo. It's a cross, with initials and dates worked into it. D. W. 2/13/08. Others: J.W., M. W., J. M., also paired with dates, all of them older. '84, '05, '06. They all look like they've been worked into his skin with a homemade tattoo needle and ballpoint ink. If it means what Oz thinks it does, his guest is not a lucky man.

 

 

"My first thought would be to tape your ribs so you get a little relief," Oz says, "but that would mean burying those cuts under the tape. That doesn't seem like the best idea."

 

 

Oz retrieves his first aid kit from the bathroom, spreading it open on the bedspread next to the stranger. "You might want to take that amulet off while I'm working."

 

 

"That's not gonna happen," the guy says, his voice so hard and final that Oz gets the idea there's a whole helluva lot of emotion walled up behind that facade.

 

 

"Sure," Oz says. He pulls up a chair to get to work, and finally gets a look at the charm. "The Shedu," he blurts in surprise.

 

 

The stranger eyes him, equally startled. "You know Mesopotamian gods?"

 

 

"I've shopped the whole marketplace. He's one of my favorites. It's a shame he's not on the A-list. People could do worse." He feels a little better about this guy, if he's on a first name basis with a deity that helps humans fight against chaos and evil. "My name's Daniel. Sometimes people call me Oz."

 

 

"Sam."

 

 

Oz nods. "I've got some herbs that'll make the healing go faster. It'll stink like hell five days past its expiration date, but it'll help."

 

 

A shadow passes over Sam's face, and Oz doesn't think it's just physical pain. "Yeah," he says at last. "Sure, thanks."

 

 

***

 

 

As the water boils, Oz finds his tea ball and rummages through his jars of herbs for the combinations he wants. "I've got some tea that'll take the edge off the rib pain for a while, and I can make a paste that'll help heal some of those cuts faster than they would on their own."

 

 

"Where'd you come by this stuff?" Sam asks.

 

 

"Got it from a curandera in Mexico." He mixes a few different kinds of herbs into his basalt molcajete, crushing them into finer pieces. "So there's something supernatural going on in these parts?"

 

 

"Was," Sam says.

 

 

Oz raises a brow but Sam doesn't elaborate. "Apocalyptic or just run-of-the-mill supernatural?"

 

 

Now it's Sam who looks curious, but Oz says nothing more, opening another jar of herbs and spoons leaves into the tea ball, then sets out a pot.

 

 

"Demons. As far as I know, no apocalypse, but it was bloody. What makes you think apocalypse?"

 

 

"Happens more than you think. The near-misses, I mean." The kettle starts to rattle and Oz takes it off the fire, pouring near-boiling water over the tea ball. A rank scent of barns too seldom mucked-out fills the apartment. "Sorry. It's only going to get worse when I make the poultice."

 

 

"You've had experience with near-misses?"

 

 

Oz shrugs. "Just a few." He pounds the herbs in the mortar a bit more.

 

 

"Such as?"

 

 

"Let's see.... There was the whole bit with Acathla. A vampire we knew raised him and he would have sucked the world into hell, but he got stopped. Oh, and before that there was the Judge. He was supposed to burn away everything human in the world. Rocket launcher took care of him. I don't think the Ascension was strictly apocalyptic, just if you happened to live in the immediate area, but that same year there was the sisterhood of Jhe. They were gonna open the hellmouth." This is the longest speech he can remember making in maybe two years, and he's not sure what's behind it. Is running into someone who fights demons enough to start him babbling after years of keeping everything to himself? Or is he just getting out the measuring tape to prove he's not half this guy's size in _every_ way?

 

 

"You're not serious."

 

 

"I used to live on a hellmouth. It was kind of like living on a fault-line, there was always the risk of apocalypse."

 

 

"Wyoming?"

 

 

"Huh. No. California. Sunnydale. You might remember that town that got swallowed by a sinkhole around six years ago."

 

 

That silences Sam for a moment. "I remember that. I went away to college the fall after that. It sounded like there was something demonic going on, and we were planning to head out that way. We got sidetracked."

 

_We? Interesting, considering this guy's as much a loner as Oz._ He lifts a brow. "Well, you know. Distractions happen."

 

 

A flicker of irritation crosses Sam's face. "Massive fights with my old man. Those tend to feel more important than apocalyptic events."

 

 

"You used to hunt with your dad?"

 

 

"Yeah." A tic pulses at his jaw. "And my brother."

 

 

Oz considers those sets of initials on Sam's tattoo. Three of them ending in W. He'd bet Sam's last name starts with one. Pouring the herb tea into a pottery cup, Oz adds a few ice cubes, then hands it to Sam. "You might want to drink it fast, before you can actually taste it."

 

 

Sam downs it as quickly as he can, finishing with a sputtered, "Jesus!" His face is screwed up in disgust.

 

 

Oz merely says, "Yeah." He pours a little of the heated water into a bowl, then adds the crushed herbs. Another wave of foulness hits Oz's sensitive nose, and he feels the restless shifting of his wolf. The wolf hates this smell, associating it with pain and weakness after a tussle with something out in the desert.

 

 

"Were you there when the town caved in?" Sam asks.

 

 

"No. I'd been gone for a few years by then. I had friends who were there." Funny how _had_ feels like the truest possible way of stating things. The last time he'd seen Xander he'd learned how much reality had been changed for Buffy and the Scoobies, and he'd somehow been left out. Dawn Summers was a lie he couldn't swallow, no matter how much he liked her or how important she was to his friends.

 

 

Sam attention narrows on him. "They didn't make it out?"

 

 

"Most did. One of my friends died there." Another sign of how things had changed: Xander would say he'd lost two friends, but the idea of Spike being on the same side was just too much to fathom. "And some others I didn't know. There was a battle, not just the sinkhole." And this is the weird thing: Of all the times he's told people he's from that town that everyone knows about, the one that disappeared, this is the first time he's been able to tell that part of it. Oz isn't sure how he feels about it, whether it's a good idea to open doors that have been bolted shut all these years. He opts for a change of subject, at least for the moment. "Is there anything after you?"

 

 

"After me?" The herbs are beginning to work on Sam, but he manages to shake off his confusion after a moment. "Oh. No. I took care of every last demon in that place."

 

 

"Then I think you should stay put for a few days. Do you have a place?"

 

 

"Not yet. I'm not staying around, though. I'm on the trail of something else."

 

 

"You're in no shape to hunt anything right now. Look. I'm leaving town for a few days tomorrow. You can stay here. Give those ribs a chance to heal."

 

 

Oz gets the feeling Sam would protest, but the tea is doing its job, and he's fading out. "Sure."

 

 

***

 

 

By the time Oz gets the poultice ready, Sam is almost completely out of it. His eyes have closed but his face scrunches up as Oz approaches. "Jesus, Dean," he mutters. As Oz starts to smear the foul-smelling paste over his wounds, Sam bats at his hands. "Cut it out, it's not funny."

 

 

"Keep still," Oz tells him. "This'll help you heal."

 

 

Sam's eyes open a slit. "You're not Dean," he points out, but he's slipped back under before Oz makes a reply.

 

 

Oz is still working when there's a knock at the door. "Hang on a second," he calls out, and rinses off the muck the best he can. He wipes his hands on a dishtowel and opens the door partway.

 

 

Alice is there, her hands behind her back. "Daniel, I just came by to say I called the plumber about that leak. He's -- oh dear god, what is that _stench_?"

 

 

Oz can't suppress a grin. "Medicinal herbs. They are kind of pungent."

 

 

"And they're so Dr. Quinn." She flicks a glance behind him. "How's your patient?" She frowns. "Still unconscious?"

 

 

"He's sleeping. I gave him something for the pain. It'll keep him out for a while, I think. I need to finish this." He swings the door open wider and steps back, and Alice takes his unspoken invitation. Funny, he realizes, how he never lost that Sunnydale habit. He settles in next to Sam and resumes his work.

 

 

Alice leans something against the wall by the door and says, "How can I help?"

 

 

"I'm good. There's just washing out the bowls after this, but they're too gross to palm off on you. What was that about the plumber?"

 

 

She shakes her head. Her glossy, stick-straight black hair swings gently. "Nothing. It was my excuse to check on you."

 

 

It occurs to him to glance at the doorway, and he sees what she left there. A baseball bat. Oz looks back toward her and raises an eyebrow.

 

 

"You think it's easy finding good tenants who pay their rent on time and in cash? And have handyman skills on top of it?"

 

 

He smiles at her. "I'm touched," he says, and means it.

 

 

Her cheeks redden and she says, "Well, you're a good guy."

 

 

Oz wonders if she'd have said so with such conviction before today. Good tenant, sure, but this is the first he's revealed much of himself to anyone since he came here. It's still precious little, he knows. "I found out one thing," he tells Alice. "Our guest here. His name is Sam."

 

 

She regards Sam for a moment, sprawled on Oz's bed beneath a blanket, looking so much younger now that he's asleep. He almost looks like he could be the kid who had apocalyptic fights with his old man. Alice gazes at him, a complex mix of emotions on her face. Oz wonders if there's someone she's thinking of -- maybe even herself, before she opened herself up to who she really is. Suddenly Oz is curious about that version of Alice. It was hard enough dealing with his inner wolf back in high school. To be a guy at that age, concealing a true self that is not a guy -- that seems big.

 

 

"How seriously is he hurt?" she asks.

 

 

"More than just a few bruises," Oz says. "Broken ribs, some bad lacerations. The herbs will help."

 

 

"Which you just happened to have lying around."

 

 

"I go hiking in some pretty rugged territory. Sometimes I get banged up."

 

 

Alice eyes him, no doubt remembering a time or two when he came back from the desert looking fairly rough.

 

 

"I told him he could stay here a few days," Oz says. "He needs to avoid moving around much. I'll be out of town for a few days anyway."

 

 

"_Oh hell no_," Alice blurts. "Taking this guy in, that's one thing, and I don't even like that. The hell you're gonna park him here and then take off for three days."

 

 

***

 

 

Oz blinks. "Shit, you're right." Her reaction is completely justified. He knows little more than this guy's name, yet he's promised him a crash pad, entirely unsupervised, in Alice's own building. "I used to be in a band, and we were always sleeping on the floors of people we barely knew. We did the same for bands passing through. It's kind of an automatic response, to make the offer. I didn't think."

 

 

Alice pushes her hand through her blue-black hair. "I get that. It's part of being a good guy."

 

 

"I'm sorry. It puts you in a bad spot. Not cool." There are guys out there who prey on women, which is bad enough, but the ones who can't handle ambiguity of any sort, much less gender ambiguity, seem to react with particular brutality. Oz is aware of that when he reads something in a newspaper -- usually the alternative papers, because that stuff often passes unnoticed by the mainstream rags. Alice has to be aware of that much of the time, if not always.

 

 

"Look," she says, "he can stay, as long as you stick around. Trail mix keeps. You can go commune with nature once he's gone, right?"

 

 

Trail mix _won't_ keep, at least not in Oz's case. But he doesn't see how he can deny her. His wolf has noticed more about Sam than his present physical weakness. Hunters haven't exactly been his best friends, and Oz has glimpsed the bone-deep grief and anger that runs through this one. Oz has seen what that mixture has done in his own case, even when he thought he had his wolf under complete control.

 

 

He looks at Sam, looking deceptively peaceful in sleep.

 

 

"I'll stay," he says. He'll figure something out. Get Sam to drink the tea each night and slip out while he's sleeping. Oz won't be able to go as deep into the desert as usual, but he'll be far enough away from other people that he won't be a danger. Maybe Sam will leave after tonight. He said he was on the trail of something. If he improves any over the night, maybe he'll insist on taking off.

 

 

Oz suddenly remembers Giles scolding him, more than once, for cutting things close when he came to lock himself away on a full moon night. And other, more measured conversations. Giles believed it was his wolf that pushed him to skate so close to the edge of safety. Was it his wolf that offered Sam a place to crash, or made the promise to Alice?

 

 

He's not sure, but now he's committed to both.

 

 

Oz meets Alice's gaze. "I'll stay," he says again. He hopes this isn't a choice that puts them all in grave danger.

 

 

***

 

 

Oz sits in his courtyard, playing his six-string, a longneck at his feet. He's a better player by far than he ever was when he was in Dingoes. Irony is a bitch, no mistake. He plays unplugged versions of old songs he played with the band, ones he's written since then, some old blues, flatpicks a little Doc Watson.

 

 

His chair is just outside the trapezoid patch of light cast by Alice's window. Oz wonders if her restlessness is caused by his houseguest. He guesses so, but knows she goes through phases where her lights blaze all night or close to it. He hopes tonight it's not fear keeping her awake.

 

 

Though he's outside the patch of light, he's hardly in the dark. Silvery light bathes the courtyard. The moon has just a narrow slice out of it. Tomorrow the sliver will hardly be noticeable, and his wolf will escape its bonds. Over the years, Oz has had less and less mastery over his wolf -- the Initiative undid part of the work he'd done, and his pilgrimage to the Sunnydale crater and the heatstroke he suffered there pretty much blasted any remaining control on the full moon. He copes by taking himself as far from people as he can get. He's got a favorite spot he's been claiming the past few months, remote and easy to defend. It's the better part of a day's travel -- he won't make it there if he leaves tomorrow an hour or two before nightfall.

 

 

He finishes one last song, polishes off his beer and heads inside. Alice's light is still on when Oz stretches out on his sofa and drifts off to sleep.

 

 

Midmorning light filters through the curtains when he wakes. Oz sits up, rubbing his face, then stumbles into the bathroom. When he emerges, he sees that Sam is not only still asleep, but seemingly hasn't shifted once during the night. Good -- not only for his ribs, but if Oz can persuade him to keep drinking the herb tea, sneaking out will be a lot easier. Even as he considers this, Oz knows it will never happen. A guy like Sam, who survives by the sharpness of his wits, won't do anything willingly that will compromise that. Tonight it'll have to be Plan B.

 

 

Whatever the hell that is.

 

 

***

 

 

Despite the late hours Alice kept last night, the laundromat is open, presumably has been since early morning. It's the time of day when there's not much going on; a bored young mother waits for her dryers while her kid drowses in a stroller. Alice is folding laundry for one of the morning's drop-off customers. She looks energized, not sleep-deprived. Oz doubts he looks that alert.

 

 

"Hey," he says.

 

 

"Daniel," she greets him, and there's pleasure in her voice.

 

 

"I hope it wasn't me who kept you awake last night. I got restless and played a little guitar."

 

 

"You didn't keep me up. I liked listening. So how's your guest?"

 

 

"Still asleep. I thought I'd head over to the diner and pick up some coffee, wondered if you'd like some." It's the least he can offer; he's still not so sure he didn't contribute to her sleeplessness.

 

 

"Sure, thanks."

 

 

"How do you like it?" He has no idea how Sam takes it, either. Oz can get one black and one with milk, and drink whichever one Sam doesn't want.

 

 

"Just say it's for Alice; they'll know." He catches her scent as the big oscillating fan in the room sweeps past her: faint traces of soap and fabric softener, with an overlay of cinnamon. And something else. Sharp, chemical.

 

 

"Turpentine," Oz blurts in surprise.

 

 

"Oh hell," Alice says. "I thought I scrubbed that off."

 

 

"It's barely noticeable," he says hastily. "I just happen to have a freakishly strong sense of smell. Runs in the family." Certainly true of him and his cousin Jordy, anyway.

 

 

"I was painting last night."

 

 

Oz spots little signs now: A trace of red just at the very ends of a few hairs framing her face. A fleck of sienna at the bed of a fingernail. "Painting painting," he says, then clarifies as he spots her confusion. "Not wall painting."

 

 

"Exactly. Oils. Mixed media, to be more exact."

 

 

Huh. He'd never have guessed. "Cool."

 

 

She shrugs. "I could show you some of them sometime." Diffident, masquerading as casual.

 

 

Oz gets that he's too laid-back sometimes, that his statements are sometimes too under and he can come off as disinterested. "Extremely cool," he elaborates. He has possibly put a little too much intensity into it this time, because Alice looks perplexed for a moment before she relaxes and laughs.

 

 

"I'll get your coffee," he says.

 

 

***

 

 

Oz hasn't planned this right. Well, not that he's planned it at all, but walking back across the street with three cardboard cups balanced carefully in his hands, he realizes he'll have to drop Alice's off and leave if he's going to deliver Sam's while it's still hot.

 

 

It's just this one thing: Now that he's found a little bit of community, just a sliver of what he'd had in Sunnydale, it's hard to pull himself away. This lone wolf shit -- it's not real, not natural to what wolves are. It's not natural to who Oz is. He's been without a pack for too long.

 

 

Well. It's not like Alice is going anywhere. Or Oz, except for three nights a month. There's time to let things flow.

 

 

As he steps onto the curb, Alice opens the door for him. "Back there on my desk is good."

 

 

Of course. No coffee on the folding counters. He settles his offerings on a clear space on the desk, beside a neat stack of outdated magazines. He hands her the cup marked A in grease pencil by the Eduardo at the diner. "I hate to tell you this, but Britney and K-Fed are splitsville." He takes up the other two coffees again.

 

 

"Yet I just can't let go of their perfection as a couple," Alice says. She sips her coffee. "I bought these at the library sale table. I layer bits of collage into my paintings sometimes."

 

 

He nods. "Cool."

 

 

She twitches a smile. "Extremely? Or just ordinarily?"

 

 

"Excessively." He moves to take a sip of his coffee, then realizes he's got a cup in each hand. "Oh. Guess I should get one of these to Sam."

 

 

"Thanks for the coffee, Daniel. I'll see you around."

 

 

"Around is where I'll be." He heads out into the late-morning heat, marveling at the fact that Xander Harris once thought Oz could offer him any sort of advice on not acting like a dork.

 

 

***

 

 

When he lets himself into his apartment, Oz finds Sam sitting up in bed, rubbing his face. Now that the herbs are cool and dry, the room doesn't smell quite so pungent.

 

 

"How are you feeling?" Oz inquires.

 

 

"Groggy," Sam mumbles. "I feel like I was out for _days_."

 

 

Too bad he wasn't, Oz thinks. "Sorry. It doesn't hit me that hard, so I didn't realize."

 

 

"How often to you use that shit?"

 

 

"Once, maybe twice a year. I save it for the special occasions, like sliding down an embankment on my face."

 

 

"And there in a nutshell is why I don't hike," Sam says.

 

 

"I got some coffee. You take it black or milky?"

 

 

"Black's fine."

 

 

Oz hands over one of the cups and Sam slugs it down as if it's some kind of antidote. Which Oz supposes it is, when he thinks about it.

 

 

"So did that stuff make me hallucinate," Sam says, "or was there some dude in a skirt?"

 

 

Oz feels a surge of protectiveness toward Alice. "That was not 'some dude in a skirt.' That's Alice." True, when he looks at her he can imagine the guy she might have been before she transitioned, boyish more than manly. But he feels that if he saw that guy, Oz could as easily imagine the woman he could be, sardonic yet sweet. As he's stuck around long enough for Alice to become a fixture in his life -- even before this tentative new friendship -- he's come to view her as just one flavor of the infinite variety of women in the world. She's Alice, the way Willow was Willow. "You had a place to stay last night because she allowed it."

 

 

"Sorry, man. Brain's still a little foggy." Sam plies himself with more black coffee.

 

 

It annoys him that Sam's blaming it on the herbs. "Yeah, well I get the hunter thing. A lot of travel, but it's not that broadening." Oz sees that this comment has hit its mark, but he doesn't feel like letting it go. "Hunter I ran across years ago had a string of werewolf teeth around his neck." Not that he'd seen it himself, but Buffy had told him.

 

 

Oz is gratified to see that this rocks Sam back. "That's fucked up. Those are people most days out of the month."

 

 

Relief gusts through Oz. "Right there with you."

 

 

"I mean, sure, you have to kill them to save other people, but taking trophies, that's barbaric."

 

 

***

 

 

Oz goes very still, though his inner wolf wants to attack. Now, while Sam is weakened, groggy, without a weapon at hand.

 

_No._ That's not what Oz is, no matter what the Initiative did to him and his control over the wolf.

 

 

"It's not like they're demons," Oz says. "They're regular people who've been attacked, turned into something against their will."

 

 

"I know that," Sam says, but there's something hard and implacable in his expression.

 

 

"Then you don't just --" Oz realizes he's making an argument for mercy that, if extended to its natural conclusion, would make vampire slaying murder. No, he tells himself. Vampires have no humanity left. They aren't walking around by daylight minding their own business, possibly unaware of what they become by the light of a full moon.

 

 

"Look," Sam says. "By the time a hunter gets on a werewolf's trail, there's already bodies. I've seen them. It's something you never forget, believe me. 'Savage' doesn't even begin to describe what a werewolf attack looks like. You go all bleeding heart on the guy who's human all but a couple of nights a month, and you sentence other humans to death. That's the truth of it, whether you want to see it or not."

 

 

"Is there a school for hunters," Oz says, "and do they offer a minor in Condescending Asshole?" Easier to react to this than to the deep threat contained in Sam's words.

 

 

"Sorry," Sam lies. "I wasn't expecting this level of naivete from someone who said he's got some experience with hunters and the supernatural." He drains the last of his coffee. "Listen, if you'll let me use your shower, I can wash this shit off and be on my way."

 

 

"Sure, yeah, knock yourself out. Let me get some clean towels." He digs out some fresh ones from the back of the linen closet. "These are a little threadbare, sorry." He hands them over, watches Sam head for the bathroom. "So you have killed --"

 

 

Sam cuts him off. "Yeah," he says, and again Oz senses a hard wall -- and this time he gets the very clear feeling that it's a dam.

 

 

"Trust me," Sam says. "It was a kindness."

 

 

***

 

 

As the bathroom door shuts behind Sam, a shiver runs through Oz. To hear the word _kindness_ spoken in such a hard tone. To know kindness is defined as a silver bullet as far as this guy's concerned. What the fuck has happened to Sam that he's got scars crisscrossing his body and his eyes are flat and cold as chips of flint? Sam's younger than Oz, he's pretty sure of it. What made him a hunter?

 

 

It's never Career Day at school. There's bound to be a story, full of blood and grief.

 

 

Doesn't mean Oz has to stick around and become another hunter's story. If he had any sense, he'd get the hell out of Dodge. Do it now, while Sam's trying to scrub off what's left of the poultice. Oz knows from personal experience that a sander would do a lot better job than the shower, which offers more of a dribble than a spray on its best days. He could gain a lot of ground in forty-five minutes to an hour. Grab the bag he always keeps packed and head on out, pausing only to slash the tires of the big black car across from the laundromat.

 

 

And what about Alice? He promised her that he'd stick around as long as Sam's here. It doesn't matter whether or not Oz thinks Sam is a threat to her -- he makes her uneasy and he's got to respect that. Instinct -- Oz lives by it and the price of ignoring it can be death. He's not discounting hers.

 

 

And Oz could be wrong. Just because Sam has the lean, obsessive look of a demon killer, it doesn't mean humans are safe -- even the ones who are human 24/7, month in and month out. Men who don't develop an appreciation for the subtle degrees of the human and the demonic probably won't have an easy time with the interstitial nature of a girl like Alice. She has plenty to be wary of from your average guy, much less a man whose vocation is killing things.

 

 

Oz can't bring himself to disappear on her for three days, and he sure as hell can't bolt into the desert and take her along. Much as he likes her, he knows he's far more of a danger to her on these nights than Sam.

 

 

Oz wishes he and Alice had called 911 the second they saw Sam collapse and walked away from the whole thing.

 

 

A surge of restlessness moves through him, and he knows it's the wolf pacing his cage, aware that it's only hours until he's free. Oz grabs his bag and the box of supplies he's already gathered and takes them out to his van. He heads to the gas station a few blocks away and fills the tank, then parks along the street. Now he can slip out tonight without alerting half the neighborhood when he starts the van.

 

_Slip out._ Abandon Alice, he means.

 

 

This is lousy. He feels like a shitheel.

 

 

***

 

 

When Oz makes it back to his apartment, the shower's still running. His wolf noses against him, ready with a fresh suggestion, since "head for the hills" got voted down. _Jump him._

 

 

He spots Alice's baseball bat there by the door where she'd forgotten it last night. One good swing and that's the end of his problems. Just barge into the bathroom, catch Sam in the shower --

 

_Really?_ he asks his wolf. _Because it seems like that's where things get infinitely more complicated._

 

 

"That's exactly why the guy thinks people like me should be shot," he mutters. He gives his head a hard shake and takes up the bat, heading up the alley to the laundromat.

 

 

Any normal month, and Oz would have left by now, up with first light to make his way to his preferred spot. Of course it makes his wolf edgy to cut things so close. Sunset's just after eight tonight; Oz wants to be gone by six.

 

_He wants to be gone now._

 

 

Alice is on her own when he walks in, wiping the tracks of a detergent spill from the front of a washer.

 

 

"Hey," Oz says. "You left this."

 

 

Reaching for it, she offers a sheepish grin. "Thanks. Alice to the rescue."

 

 

"Don't do that. It was cool." Stupid. That's become his fallback word, and it's becoming meaningless. "Brave. It's been a long time since anyone had my back."

 

 

"Well, that's too bad," she says softly. "Good guys are a dwindling natural resource."

 

 

It's hard to know what to say to that. Oz feels his internal struggle so close to the surface, the desire to lash out at Sam for posing a threat to the stunted little life he's made for himself here. Good itself is a dwindling resource, at least within him.

 

 

"Are you okay?" she asks.

 

 

"Sure, yeah, I'm cool." Oz winces. "No, actually. I'm restless. It was just weird having Sam there. I couldn't really settle in to sleep for a long time."

 

 

She glances out toward the black car. "He's still at your place?"

 

 

"Yeah. He's working on getting that poultice cleaned off. It's a project."

 

 

Alice nods. "Listen, it's dead in here right now. I'm going to lock up for a bit and go upstairs for lunch. You could join me." She hesitates. "Or maybe we should go hit the cafe. My paintings are all over the place up there. I'd like you to see them sometime, but they aren't exactly restful."

 

 

"I'd really like to see them," Oz says in a rush.

 

 

She smiles, and there's a dimple he's never noticed before, just on the one side of her mouth. "Yeah?"

 

 

"Yeah."

 

 

"Cool," she says, and it makes him laugh. Alice adjusts the hands of the clock face on the _Be back soon!_ sign and hangs it in the door, then turns the lock. He feels the nervousness and excitement shimmering off her. "I've never showed them to anyone." She gestures behind him. "Stairs are that way."

 

 

***

 

 

The boundary between Alice's business realm and her personal world is the entrance to the stairway. The pale green of the laundromat walls gives way to deep eggplant, scattered everywhere with shiny little bits of Mexican tin -- flaming hearts, crosses, Day of the Dead skeletons in mariachi costumes -- as well as framed snapshots, altered postcards, vintage tarot cards and tiny paintings. Oz wants to linger to look at everything, but Alice keeps climbing the stairs.

 

 

"Anything I should know?" she tosses back to him. "Vegetarian? Allergic to kumquats?"

 

 

Vegetarian? Not exactly. There's a fair chance he'll be waking up tomorrow with fox fur in his teeth. "Nope. I'm pretty much an omnivore."

 

 

"I could throw together a frittata," she suggests.

 

 

"Frittata?"

 

 

"Kind of an omelet without the tears."

 

 

"I am on a tear-free diet, so that sounds good."

 

 

At the top of the stairs Oz finds himself in a large sunlit room, bright and white, more window than wall. The standard kitchen equipment lines one wall, along with a length of counter space, but the kitchen island and beyond are taken up by neatly arranged painting supplies. There's a canvas on an easel, but it's at an angle where he can't see the painting in progress.

 

 

"This is nowhere near being an ideal arrangement," Alice says, "but the best light to work by is in here, and I make sure the paint and solvents don't get near the food and cookware and that, and I never eat in here. Get you a beer? I've got some Negro Modelo."

 

 

"Sounds nice." Sounds like Alice. A little more depth and complexity than the standard choice.

 

 

She opens a couple of bottles. "Glass, or straight from the bottle?"

 

 

"Bottle's fine." He accepts the one she hands him.

 

 

"Why don't I give you the tour? Then you can look closer while I'm making lunch."

 

 

"Sure."

 

 

Alice ushers him into the next room which, like the kitchen, serves two purposes. One third has an oak dining table, an antique with a few nicks and scars. Nearby is an old standing desk where she clearly does her cooking prep.

 

 

The rest of the space is clearly living room, with a long sofa, a couple of chairs, and low bookshelves that line the walls without compromising wallspace for hanging art.

 

 

Unlike the eclectic mix in the stairwell, the paintings here clearly were created by the same artist. The colors are deep and bold, with thick layerings of paint and bits of text applied to the canvas. He doesn't have the vocabulary for what it is she's done, but the paintings all have this haunting sense of duality.

 

 

"Jesus," he whispers, and he can sense Alice almost holding her breath beside him, but he really doesn't have any other words to offer. He approaches one of the paintings.

 

 

It's done in deep blues, with magpie flashes of silver. Oz realizes it's a man in a police uniform, standing stiff and at attention. His badge has a black band across the front. His face is indistinct, shadowed, but when Oz steps closer he sees that Alice has layered newspaper text into the planes of his face.

 

 

Odd that she'd give this such a prominent place, he thinks, given her extreme distrust of authority figures, but then he remembers that she has cops in her family.

 

 

Nearby is a painting of a woman -- of Alice, he realizes immediately -- all sea greens and purple shadows. Her hair flows out around her as if she is underwater, and she stares out at the viewer, cradling something in graceful hands as if she's about to reach out and offer whatever she's holding, but caught in that suspended moment before. The ribbons of shadowed purple have strips of text woven into them too, but layered over so what they say is hidden.

 

 

"Jesus," he says again as his mind makes a leap. "A selkie."

 

 

Alice twitches a nervous smile. "You're good."

 

 

Oz's breath gusts out of him. "These -- these are amazing."

 

 

***

 

 

For the space of a couple of heartbeats, Oz wonders if Alice really could be a selkie, then he chides himself. That thought could only occur to a Sunnydale boy. What selkie would choose to live in a town within spitting distance (if you could work up enough saliva to spit in this climate) of half a dozen dry lakes? Alice is too comfortable with herself for that kind of suicidal despair.

 

 

"I like the transformation imagery, for obvious reasons," Alice says. "And hidden selves. In myth and folklore and science. You'll see it in a lot of the paintings."

 

 

"There's a ton of folklore to work with," Oz says. "Just about every culture has something. Wampus cats and lachusas and _huse bjorn_."

 

 

"Yeah," she says, "and then there's the obscure stuff."

 

 

Oz gives her a sidelong grin. "I kinda made a study myself. Did a lot of traveling, gathering folklore."

 

 

"Grad student?"

 

 

"Dropout. I don't get motivated by degrees so much as by obsession. Seemed like a more interesting way to travel than doing the standard backpack and youth hostel thing."

 

 

"Sometime I'd love to hear some of the stories you found."

 

 

"Sure." Oz shifts his attention to another painting, hoping to avoid the question of why the stories are an obsession. There's a dense one with deep greens that make Oz think of a cultivated garden given over to such tangled overgrowth that it verges on jungle. Or maybe it's a cemetery. There's a stone angel in aged grey, the kind you see in old graveyards, with sorrowful, downcast face. The angel's hands cradle something, but in this case it's visible to the onlooker. A revolver, made up of tiny fragments of magazine text and photos, layer on layer until it has an almost 3-D effect. The pose of the angel's hands reminds Oz of Alice's when she held Sam's gun. There's something personal and painful in this painting, yet it's undeniably beautiful. There are strips of text half hidden beneath the curtains of greenery, too, but nothing he can make out.

 

 

"You've never showed these to anyone? I can't believe they aren't in a gallery somewhere."

 

 

Alice bristles. "Why? Because art isn't real unless there's a pricetag on it?"

 

 

"No, but it's -- it's like the difference between sitting in my backyard and playing guitar and when I used to perform with the band."

 

 

"Which is money."

 

 

Oz can't contain a laugh. "Believe me, playing in a band was more an expensive hobby than a moneymaking proposition. Over the expanse of my so-called career, I'm definitely in the hole. What I'm talking about is communication. People should see these. They're phenomenal."

 

 

"A person is seeing them," Alice says. "I'm happy to start there."

 

 

She shows him her bedroom, with several more paintings and an enormous sleigh bed. Then she tells him to feel free to wander around and look at the paintings while she gets lunch started. There are more selkie paintings and another couple with police imagery, and several that contain echoes of the Tarot imagery he saw in the framed cards in the stairwell.

 

 

He comes back to the deep greens of the one with the stone angel. His wolf takes a particular interest too, and it occurs to him that maybe he should stay out of the desert these next few nights. He can't get to his favored spot, so he's likely to be more exposed than he'd like should Sam find reason to follow him. Oz likes the idea of heading out into the forest, Sequoia or Inyo. Plenty of cover, plenty of opportunities to melt into the landscape away from roadways. He imagines the smell of earth and lush vegetation, the sounds that are wholly different from those he's used to.

 

 

And campsites and people. No. There are reasons he's made a habit of going to the desert. He tears himself away from the painting.

 

 

Alice nudges the oven door shut and straightens. "That'll be ready in fifteen. I didn't think I would do this, but do you want to see the one I started last night?"

 

 

"Sure, if that's okay."

 

 

She adjusts the angle of the easel so Oz can get a look. A wash of deep red is the first thing he sees, and a pale circle of collaged magazine text the size of a dinner plate. And in the lower right quarter of the canvas, just beginning to emerge from the surrounding color, is the darker form of a wolf.

 

 

***

 

 

"A wolf," Oz says, as if this is as much of an intuitive leap as "selkie."

 

 

"Yeah," Alice says. "I just got this image in my head last night and it wouldn't go away."

 

 

"Huh. Is that how you normally work?"

 

 

"Sometimes yes, sometimes no." Her bracelets -- black, white, red -- clack as she tips up her beer. "Most of my work is pretty intentional, but now and then intuition decides."

 

 

"'Intuition decides' -- I like that." He studies the wolf. The blood red background makes Oz uneasy, but the body language of the wolf itself isn't aggressive -- his muzzle is lifted skyward, howling. Not menacing, communicating. But people tend to know so little about wolves, she might be unaware of the disconnect. "Interesting choice, red."

 

 

"Yeah, I don't know. I'm always drawn to certain colors for particular paintings, and that's where this one's started. There'll be a lot of layers of paint, by the time I'm done."

 

 

Oz peers at the moon, its intricate patchwork of words unobscured by paint. It's not much more readable than the painted-over text collages -- there's a base of text that looks like a science magazine article, covered by random words, though they are not so random. _Luminosity, bright, reflected, face._ The places where the words become a dense tangle, he realizes, are the shadowed places on the moon's surface. When the bones of Alice's moon are covered with the flesh of paint, the same man in the moon illusion will be apparent. Will the finished image have the same serene feeling to it, or will it be altered to reflect the same disquiet he gets from the blood red night around it?

 

 

"You think maybe all of this has something to do with this guy Sam?" he asks. "Having his gun locked in your safe? The lone wolf thing?"

 

 

"I don't know," she says. "I don't analyze while I'm painting, it gets in the way."

 

 

Oz nods, stepping back from the canvas. "Thanks for showing me." _Thanks for freaking me the fuck out. _ "It's interesting to see the process, especially the collage stuff. You must've spent hours last night just going through magazines."

 

 

"No, I have files full of clippings and words, all organized so I can get what I want when I want it. That's what I do with all that time sitting in the laundromat." Alice turns her easel back toward its corner, and Oz catches two words amid the jumble of text: _dark side_, in a thick font, in brown ink. When its back is turned to him (dark side), Oz feels like he can breathe again.

 

 

"Grab another beer if you like, Alice says. "This will be out in about ten seconds."

 

 

***

 

 

Oz snags another beer from her fridge. "How about you?"

 

 

"Still working on this one." She pulls the pan out of the oven and sits it on a burner. "Everything okay?"

 

 

"Sure, yeah. A little restless, I guess. Usually I'm off on my retreat by this time."

 

 

"Right. Listen, I appreciate you giving up the nature thing. I feel a lot more comfortable with him around if you're here too."

 

 

"No big," Oz says, and he wonders if it sounds as false to Alice as it does to him.

 

 

"No, it is," she says, and he's glad that she recognizes this. "Do you have a favorite trail out there?"

 

 

"Not so much. It's a big place. I like to explore."

 

 

Alice carries the frittata pan to the table, saying, "If you'd grab the salad bowl, we'll be ready."

 

 

Oz retrieves the salad from her prep station and places it on the table next to the eggs, settling into a chair at Alice's invitation. While he's been engrossed in her paintings, she's set the table with Mexican glassware and pottery as richly colored as her art. Her bracelets clacking quietly, she serves some salad and eggs to Oz and then herself.

 

 

As he takes up his fork, a rush of feeling moves through him, so strong he has to sit with it for a moment.

 

 

Alice notices his hesitation. "Is there something else you need?"

 

 

He flickers a smile. "Nothing at all. It's just been a long time since someone cooked for me."

 

 

"It's good to have someone to cook for. When I'm painting, I resent every minute I'm away from my work, so it tends to be the fastest, easiest thing at hand. Which is probably what it'll be while I'm working on the wolf. So this is nice."

 

 

"I'll repay the favor. I'm pretty decent at Tibetan food."

 

 

Her brows rise. "Tibetan? What's that like?"

 

 

"Kinda like Chinese food with potatoes. It's not the same without the yak butter, but it's close. I use ghee, and it works."

 

 

"I'd like that," Alice says. "_After_ your houseguest is gone."

 

_His houseguest._ The hunter.

 

 

The wolf's hackles rise, and Oz tries not to wish he'd bolted for the desert instead of keeping his promise to Alice.

 

 

***

 

 

When Oz lets himself into his apartment, he finds Sam at the table, hunched over a laptop, a button-down shirt from his laundry duffel flapping open around him. He's scrawling notes on the back of Oz's note inviting him to help himself to any food or drink he finds, and there's a beer bottle at his elbow, sweaty with condensation.

 

 

Oz feels a little thrill when he sees the half-consumed beer. While there's nothing particularly dangerous about drinking after using the herbs, it tends to take Oz down before he finishes the second beer. This may solve the problem of how to get past Sam tonight, because it sure as hell doesn't look like Sam's in any shape to leave.

 

 

"Hey," Oz says. "Alice sent you something to eat."

 

 

Sam raises an eyebrow.

 

 

"It's an egg thing. It's good." He sets the plate down, and Sam shoves his laptop back, though he doesn't close it.

 

 

Oz turns to get a fork, and grabs himself a beer from the fridge, just to be encouraging. "You ready for another beer?"

 

 

"Not just yet. Thanks." Once Oz hands over the fork, he attacks his meal with a ferocity that Oz -- and his wolf -- find familiar.

 

 

Oz seats himself at the table, cracks open his beer. "How're you feeling?"

 

 

"A little rough," Sam admits. "I went out to the car a little while ago to get some things."

 

 

The two statements don't seem to go together, until Oz takes a look around and sees the duffel moved from where Oz had left it, tumbled onto its side and left in an awkward spot on the floor. Yeah. He can imagine how well that went. Sam's boots are where Oz had left them, though, neatly arranged side by side.

 

 

"Let me guess," Oz says. "Nothing distracts you from broken rib pain like barefooting it on a blazing hot pavement."

 

 

That raises a smirk. "Something like that." Pushing back his empty plate, Sam tips up his beer and takes a few healthy swallows. "That was good."

 

 

"So. Looks like you've picked up the trail of something." Part of him wants to tell Sam he's in no shape right now to be hunting anything bigger than a field mouse; the rest of him wants to send him off with a sandwich and a hearty "Good luck!"

 

 

"Could be."

 

 

Oz had caught a brief glimpse of the screen as Sam had pushed his laptop back. Grainy surveillance shots. Whatever it was had the shape of a human. "What sort of thing is it?"

 

 

He senses he's skirting the edges of Sam's patience. The hunters this guy meets probably don't ask many questions, and he'd guess there's precious little voluntary exchange of information. Oz tips back his beer, aware of Sam's scrutiny.

 

 

"Trickster," Sam says after a long moment. "Ever run into one of those in Sunnydale?"

 

 

"Can't say I have." Unless you could count Ethan Rayne.

 

 

"It's a minor god," Sam says.

 

 

That lets out Ethan Rayne, Oz supposes.

 

 

"They seem to specialize -- or this one does, at any rate -- in giving people their just desserts. He especially likes to go for pompous asses. They're tough to track. You can't exactly put out a Google alert for 'highly ironic deaths.'"

 

 

"So this thing does kill people."

 

 

A flicker of dark emotion passes over Sam's face. "He does."

 

 

Casually, Oz tips back his chair to snag another beer bottle from the fridge. He twists the cap and sets it in front of Sam, who seizes it and downs a good third. When Sam sets down the bottle a little too hard, Oz sees the signs of the amplified effects of the alcohol.

 

 

"He killed my brother," Sam says, his voice hard yet brittle. "I'm going to find that fucker and make him take it back."

 

 

***

 

_Make him take it back._ Oz gets the fierce grief, he really does. But this isn't a schoolyard insult -- it's death. It's not something you get reversed with a roll in the dust and the delivery of a bloody nose.

 

 

Oz suspects there's a helluva lot better way of phrasing that information for Sam's benefit. "Look," he says, "what you're talking about, that's big. Some friends of mine, they raised another friend who died. There was a lot of emotional fallout."

 

 

Sam's lip curls. "I don't give a shit about emotional fallout. Whatever fucking _fallout_ there is, we'll deal with it."

 

 

So that phrasing _wasn't_ significantly better. Oz picks at the label of his beer bottle. "So what happened?"

 

 

"Which time?" Sam slams back another third of his beer.

 

 

"What do you mean?"

 

 

"Well, there's the time he got hit by a car. And the time he got an arrow through his eye and straight into his brain. There's the broken neck -- wait, there were three of those: the one in the bathtub, the time with the skateboarder, and the --"

 

 

"Wait wait wait," Oz says. He's beginning to wish he hadn't given Alice her bat back. This is a serious case of crazy. "I'm not following."

 

 

"That's where the Trickster comes in," Sam says. "He stuck me in a time loop, living the same day over and over again. Every version of that day, my brother died. A hundred days -- the same day -- a hundred different deaths. Nothing I did changed a thing, just the _way_ he died."

 

 

Oz sits with that a moment, trying to absorb it. "But something changed, because you're here."

 

 

"Yeah, something changed." Sam shifts in his chair, his breath hissing with pain. "We caught up to the Trickster. That was it, he got bored with the time loop. I woke up, and it was the next day." Sam drains the beer and slams down the empty. He closes his eyes for a long moment.

 

 

"But that wasn't the end," Oz prompts.

 

 

"No. We were getting ready to leave town, and some fucking tweaker shot Dean in a robbery. And that was it. No reset this time. Just me, hunting without him, knowing that he's in --" His hands ball into fists and he looks away.

 

 

"When was this?"

 

 

"Well over a year ago."

 

 

Oz leans back and retrieves another beer from the fridge, setting it on the table. "And that's the world you live in, and nobody else does."

 

 

Startled, Sam jerks his attention back to Oz. It makes his wolf uneasy to be on the receiving end of his direct gaze.

 

 

"You saw your brother's death over a hundred times. You remember every one of them, every attempt to change what was going to happen."

 

 

"Yeah." Sam twists the top off the beer, takes a sip.

 

 

"But your brother didn't have any memories that carried over."

 

 

"No. Each time it was a brand new day for him. Each time I had to convince him." He rubs his hands over his face. "God damn. This is potent stuff, this beer."

 

 

"It's local. There's not a lot to be said for living in your own private reality. It fucks with your head to feel like everyone else's reality is a lie."

 

 

Whether he's feeling the beers or not, Sam's gaze is sharp and direct. "You say that like you've lived it."

 

 

"Yeah. Kind of. Though in my case the mind-fuckery wasn't aimed at me. Some of my friends back in Sunnydale had their memories altered. Actually, it was more global than just them, but this mojo, it didn't touch me. Last time I saw them, they were telling me all these memories of things that never happened. Things I'd done, which I knew I hadn't done. I couldn't be around them."

 

 

"What was it -- a trickster? If it's the same one, when I kill him, you might get your reality back."

 

 

"It wasn't a trickster. It had something to do with averting an apocalypse, and my friends have chosen to keep that reality. I totally get why. I'm all for them being happy in their world -- I just can't live in it. It's a lie."

 

 

Sam tips his bottle up and takes another long pull. "If I could have my brother alive again, I'd live in any damn lie you could name."

 

 

***

 

 

Oz wonders if there's any circumstance that would make him willing to live in a lie. If it would bring Willow back to him somehow, would he hesitate to leave the truth of things behind? He could see himself being tempted, but that's just not how Oz's head works. Not if he knew he was living in a lie. One reality is enough; he can't manage two.

 

 

Sam is getting more loose-limbed, his eyes going half-mast, but he keeps shaking himself out of it. Oz flicks a glance at the clock, silently imploring Sam to _just go down, already_.

 

 

He's cutting things close.

 

 

"You look beat," he tells Sam at last. "Why don't you crash for the night?"

 

 

"Naw, I'm good," Sam says, giving Oz a preview of his ability to live within a lie. Oz knows he's going to go down, but he can't wait any longer.

 

 

"Tell you what," he says, casually as possible. "I'm going to get another six pack or two. Anything I can grab while I'm out?"

 

 

"I'm good," Sam says again. "Aren't you good?"

 

 

"There's just one beer left, and the store will be closed if I wait. Just hang tight."

 

 

Oz cuts through a couple of alleys to get to his van. He wishes he hadn't cut it so fucking close. If he'd left ten minutes earlier, he'd swing by the store and buy a pound or two of hamburger, take the edge off his hunger so he won't kill anything anyone will miss. He won't get far from inhabited places. People keep pushing farther and farther out into the wild areas.

 

 

His skin is starting to itch all over as he settles himself behind the wheel of the van and stands on the gas pedal. His teeth ache something fierce. He hits the road out of town and floors it, but the van isn't made for speed. He coaxes it to fifty mph as his shoulders, hips, ankles and wrists start to throb. Oz lets out a groan that comes out sounding like a snarl.

 

 

There's not much between these small towns, but open spaces aren't desolate, not this close. He can see lights from houses dotting the landscape. Oz pushes the van as fast as it will go, but it makes an ominous sound once it tops sixty.

 

 

A whole body pain slices through him as everything starts to shift at once, and he lets out a howl. Nothing more he can do now; Oz pulls onto the shoulder and cuts the engine as another spasm tears through him, accompanied by the sound of ripping cloth.

 

 

Oz throws the key into its hiding place and shoves open the door as he falls across the front seat, writhing in pain.

 

 

Another moment later, and he feels better than any human ever felt. Strength surges through his limbs, and he revels in it.

 

 

He bursts through the passenger door and lopes out into the darkening night.

 

 

***

 

 

Oz wakes to a pounding headache and gooseflesh, curled in on himself by the side of the road. At least his wolf recognized the van as the closest thing he had to a den, and brought him to rest beside it where he might be screened from view of anyone who happened to be driving by before twilight gave way to sunup.

 

 

Getting to his feet, he brushes pea gravel and dust off his skin, and finds he's smearing blood on his hip and leg. He reaches in the van for one of the jugs of water he carries into the desert, as well as a threadbare towel. His breath hisses through his teeth as he upends the jug over his head and shoulders and scrubs at his skin. As quickly as he can, he cleans up, then chugs what's left of the water before he dresses and climbs behind the wheel.

 

 

Oz feels the weight of a heavy meal in his belly, and he wonders exactly what it was. He hopes to hell the blood that covered his hands and face and chest was animal, not human.

 

 

He hopes just as fervently he can get back home before either Sam or Alice rouses and discovers he's not around. It's already nearing 6 a.m., and Alice opens the laundromat at 7:00.

 

 

When he makes it back to town he finds a different parking spot for his van and stops by the minimart for a newspaper, just for a legitimate excuse to be out in case he gets caught coming in. He sprints through alleys to his place. He lets himself in as quietly as possible, then shucks off his clothes down to his shorts -- Sam is just the sort of guy who'd notice him sleeping in different clothes from the ones he wore last night -- and jams the newspaper under the sofa cushions, now that it's a liability instead of an asset. Then he sinks onto the sofa to grab whatever sleep he can.

 

 

It feels like too much and not nearly enough when he emerges. The smell of food and coffee is what rouses him. Sam is already eating, standing over a map spread out on the table, forking his breakfast out of a round tinfoil container from the diner.

 

_Leaving._ Oz offers fervent thanks to every deity within hearing range. The last thing he wants is another night like last night.

 

 

Sitting up, he scrubs his hands over his face.

 

 

"Rough morning, huh?" Sam says. "Me too. I didn't realize how many I had last night."

 

 

"Yeah. They sneak up on you."

 

 

"I bought coffee and breakfast," Sam says. "I figured it was my turn."

 

 

"Thanks." Oz stumbles to the bathroom to relieve himself and splash water on his face, checking to be sure there are no telltale dried patches of blood left on his skin.

 

 

"Food and coffee's on the counter," Sam says as Oz returns.

 

 

He's not really hungry, having a belly full of fresh meat, but as far as Sam's concerned they hadn't had anything but beer since late afternoon. Oz pries the lid off the foil container, fighting a pulse of mild nausea. He transfers the eggs, bacon and home fries onto a plate, but leaves the coffee in its covered go-cup. "Want a plate for yours?" he asks. "Or a real fork?"

 

 

"Nah, this is good."

 

 

Oz approaches the table and peers at Sam's map, and nearly drops his plate. The map is a fairly detailed map of Death Valley and the surrounding area. It already has a few pencil marks on it, in an area he'd instinctively avoided in both wolf and human states. But the area that's the focus of Sam's attention now is closer to where Oz ditched the van last night.

 

 

He tries for casually curious. "What's up?"

 

 

"I heard some guys talking at the diner about a local cattle mutilation. Up around here." He circles an area of the map with his finger. "At first I thought maybe it was the demons I killed on Saturday, but this was fresh. I figured I should go check it out."

 

 

This is bad. Beyond bad. Oz makes his face carefully blank. "I thought you were closing in on the Trickster."

 

 

Sam shakes his head. "I'm always three steps behind. This is here and now, and it's too close to town to let it go. This thing might graduate from animals to people. It picked off the family dog before it killed the steer."

 

_This thing._ This thing would have been deep in the desert taking down a wild animal, if it hadn't been for Sam himself. And Oz's attempt not to bring suspicion on himself has brought down disaster instead. "So what's the plan?"

 

 

Sam pulls the map off the table, folds it and tucks it away. "As soon as I clean up, I'm going out to where it happened, see what I can learn. Get a look at the carcass, see what kind of wounds it has. Figure out exactly what this thing is."

 

 

***

 

 

Oz goes very still and watchful while Sam unzips a dark suit out of the garment bag he brought in when he went out for breakfast, but his mind is racing in half a dozen different directions. _Leave now_ and _Kill him_ being the two destinations that are lit up like Las Vegas on the horizon.

 

_I don't kill people_, he tells himself firmly. Veruca, yeah, but she would have killed Willow. He doesn't even kill house pets -- wouldn't have done that, if he'd been on his usual hunting ground.

 

 

He can run. The moment Sam steps in the shower, Oz can head for his van and make his way somewhere else. He considers Sequoia again. It covers a lot of ground. There's got to be an area that's remote enough, if he heads in by one of the fire lanes. The problem is, though Sequoia is close, the closest access point is both very popular with mountain climbers and tightly controlled.

 

 

The moment Sam shuts himself in the bathroom, Oz scrapes the rest of his breakfast into the trash and lets himself out of the apartment. He's almost made it to the van when he remembers Sam's gun.

 

 

There's no chance Sam's leaving without it, and once he tears apart Oz's place to find it and doesn't, he's bound to think of Alice. Oz refuses to leave her vulnerable to a pissed-off Sam.

 

 

He launches a vicious kick at the nearest Dumpster, then turns back and retraces his step through the alleys until he reaches his street. He heads across to the diner for two coffees.

 

 

"Hey, man," Eduardo says, "shouldn't you be off doing your meditation thing or whatever?"

 

 

Oz makes a disgusted face. "Unexpected houseguest. My cousin."

 

 

"That tall guy? Man, you've got some diverse gene pool in your family."

 

 

That almost teases a grin from Oz. He grabs his coffees and tells Eduardo he'll see him in a couple of days if not before.

 

 

There's a couple of kids in dreadlocks leaving with backpacks of freshly washed clothes as he crosses the street. One holds the door open for him. His wolf's nose crinkles at the smell of patchouli, but Oz appreciates the laundering away of a few layers of the stuff. The scent takes him back to his own backpacking days, seeking some cure for what he was, sleeping in hostels on the nights it was safe to do so.

 

 

Alice sits at her desk with an X-Acto knife, slicing pages from a magazine. She looks up at his approach and offers a smile. "Hey, Daniel."

 

 

"Hey. Brought you some coffee."

 

 

"Well, thanks." She accepts the cup he offers and has a sip. "How's the houseguest?"

 

 

"More energetic today, if a little hungover."

 

 

"You look a little rocky yourself."

 

 

"There was beer." And a bellyful of steak tartare, but he'll leave that part out. "He's getting out today, but I'm not sure if he's going far. I thought maybe if I give his gun back, he might go farther."

 

 

"As in away?"

 

 

"That's the hope."

 

 

"What if he doesn't?"

 

 

"Look, I've got somewhere to be today, and I didn't want him harassing you when he doesn't find it in my place."

 

 

She makes a half scowl. "No, it's better if he's just running around with a gun."

 

 

"I'm pretty sure he's not a danger to you. If he isn't pissed off about you having his stuff."

 

 

She heaves a sigh. "Do you know what you're doing?"

 

_Fuck no_, he thinks. "I'm sure about this."

 

 

"All right." She rises and heads back to the office.

 

 

He notices the curve of her back as she bends to open the safe. Her long but slender hand when she hands the gun to him. Without knowing he's going to, he blurts, "Can you close up today? Take a day trip somewhere out in the woods?"

 

 

Alice blinks, considering. Taking Oz in.

 

 

He's not sure whether this is a good plan, or even a plan at all. He just wants to be away from Sam, and wants Alice to be okay. Maybe he'll get her to leave him in the forest and come back for him in the morning. He'll figure it out.

 

 

"Oh hell," she says. "Why not?"

 

 

***

 

 

The shower has stopped by the time he lets himself back in, but Sam hasn't yet emerged from the bathroom. Oz sets the gun and bullets on the table, grabs a change of clothes and four pint bottles of water, shoving them into a messenger bag. As he heads back up the alley, he hears the metal shutter rattling down over the front of the laundromat.

 

 

Alice snaps a padlock on the shutter. "You may have noticed, I'm not a van girl. We can take my car." She has a red Mini in a shade that he'd swear -- especially after seeing her paintings -- is a custom color. It's not the most inconspicuous color, but she keeps it garaged and Sam wouldn't have seen it.

 

 

"Sure."

 

 

"North?" she asks. "Makes the most sense."

 

 

"Works for me." Anything in the opposite direction of Sam works for him. He doesn't feel able to breathe until they're out of town.

 

 

"Considering the high degree of planning that went into this," she says, "I'm thinking Mammoth Lakes."

 

 

It's resorty, not ideal as a wolf-time retreat, but she's right. Neither of them is dressed for hiking or prepared in any other way. He'll figure out a plan by nightfall to get to somewhere less populated. "Sounds good."

 

 

"So what's with the mad scramble to get out of town?" Alice asks. "You took the guy in, and said you didn't think I had anything to worry about, and now it's a fire drill."

 

 

"I can't explain it," Oz says, and that's certainly true. "Something pinged my intuition and pinged it hard."

 

 

"You're not a guy who gets into a panic without good cause."

 

 

He wants to protest that he's not in a panic now, but he realizes she's on target. "Not so much, no."

 

 

"Well then," she says, "that's good enough for me."

 

 

***

 

 

Oz can't even remember how long it's been since he was in a car and someone else was at the wheel. Or when he'd last shared such an intimate space with anyone else -- he used to pick up hitchhikers back before the whole thing with Xander and Dawn, but now he avoids the forced company of sharing a ride.

 

 

So he's not sure how awkward things are going to get over the course of ninety minutes in Alice's Mini.

 

 

But Alice still has the skill Oz has lost. She opens with, "So you were in a band."

 

 

"Long time ago."

 

 

"What kind of music did you play?"

 

 

"I think most of our audiences had the same question," he says, prompting a grin from Alice. "Rock and alt, mostly. The occasional badly received venture into country and reggae. We weren't very good at any of it."

 

 

"Well then, you got better."

 

 

It surprises Oz how much this statement pleases him. "I've had some years of practice."

 

 

"Have you thought about doing it again?"

 

 

"No," he says immediately, emphatically. He's shut down parts of his life that remind him too much of what he used to have. It took a long time before he started playing music again at all.

 

 

Alice is a little taken aback by the curtness of his response, but she recovers quickly. "What was the name of your band?"

 

 

Oz takes her cue in trying to lighten things up. "Try and guess. Just for fun."

 

 

"Hmm. The Daniel Osborne Experience."

 

 

That pulls a laugh from him.

 

 

"The Book of Daniel. The ... Totally Original Cover Band. The Strolling Roans. The That Would Make A Good Name for a Rock Band."

 

 

"Good one."

 

 

"The Laconics. The Gary Coopers."

 

 

Oz shoots her a look. Notices again how sweet her smile is, even when there's an impish thing happening at the same time. "Is that some kind of commentary?"

 

 

"Daniel, you conserve words the way most people around here do water. Even your _laugh_ is laconic." She uncorks a _Hah!_, an uncannily perfect imitation of his earlier laugh, and that prompts another bout of laughter, this one stretching out to a good five syllables' worth. "So are you going to tell me?"

 

 

Tell her what? That he hasn't been this at ease with another person in years, hasn't felt the initial stirring of attraction to a girl in even longer? "Tell you?"

 

 

"The name of your band."

 

 

"Oh. Dingoes Ate My Baby."

 

 

Alice treats him to the sound of her own laughter, and Oz suddenly finds the initial stirrings have progressed to fully Osterized.

 

 

***

 

 

After the refresher course, Oz manages to flash a little conversational skill of his own, asking Alice questions about herself.

 

 

"Have you always lived around here?"

 

 

"No, I lived in Ohio until I turned twenty. Then I got out, moved to New York, then San Francisco, and I never went back."

 

 

"How'd you wind up here, of all places?"

 

 

"I met a guy. Online romance, kind of."

 

 

Oz raises a brow. "Kind of?"

 

 

"Well, we were pretty convinced we were soulmates after hundreds of emails and phone calls. So I picked up and moved out here. It was a very awkward meeting. There was no chemistry at all, it turned out. But we _liked_ each other."

 

 

"So what happened?"

 

 

"I stayed, we were roommates. He encouraged me to take the painting seriously. He owned the laundromat; he'd inherited it. He left it to me when he died."

 

 

"Wow." A question occurs to Oz, but he's not entirely sure it's one he should ask. "Was he -- is he the one in the painting? With the gun?"

 

 

"No, that was another guy. I'll tell you about him sometime. No, Evan had a crappy heart, was born with it. So we knew he didn't have a lot of time. Didn't make it any easier, though."

 

 

Oz hates to think of Alice enduring that kind of sadness with two men. He wonders if maybe the last thing on earth he should do is ask her to get involved with a guy who's a part-time werewolf. "I know that's been awhile. You owned the place even when I moved here. What's that been like, to stay?"

 

 

"It's been good. I didn't really know what to expect, a small town like this. But Evan was such a sweet guy in a way I'm not even sure I can describe. People loved him and felt very protective of him. So I got a few years under that umbrella, and people got used to me. They accept me. And they look out for me, too. I had some trouble with people passing through town, and the guys at the diner, they were good."

 

 

Oz nods. "It's a good place."

 

 

"How'd you wind up here? Where'd you live before?"

 

 

"Nowhere, for a long time. I've been wandering for years, pretty much the world over. I kind of ran out of places."

 

 

"And you ended up in _Lone Pine?_"

 

 

Oz watches the forest landscape sliding by the car's windows. "I needed a place that has wilderness close by. I do a lot better with it than without. I like the desert."

 

 

"Well," Alice says, "I'm glad you wound up here."

 

 

***

 

 

As they come to the outskirts of Mammoth Lakes, the clouds start piling up in the skies. "Oh hell. That wasn't in the forecast," Alice says. She chews her lower lip.

 

 

It's been dry and windy, and Oz doesn't like to think about a lightning strike up here. "Guess the plan has shifted to a long lunch somewhere with a good view."

 

 

He half expects her to quirk a smile and say, "Plan? There was a plan?" but instead she says, "Not too close to the windows, okay?"

 

 

An impulse to tease dies away when he glances over at her. "Sure. Whatever you like."

 

 

She makes a visible effort to shake her sudden mood. "Have you been up here much?"

 

 

"No. When I get away, I really like being in the middle of nowhere. This is pretty resorty for me."

 

 

Now the smile comes. "Away from the Lone Pine rat race?"

 

 

"Well, you know. Dishwashing can be a stressful career. How about you?"

 

 

"Evan and I used to come up now and again. We had a tradition, the annual Glad to Be Alive dinner, when we'd get all dressed up and go someplace extravagant, whether we could really afford it or not. We both had a terrible weakness for escargot. Or as he'd call it, 'grubs.'"

 

 

"That's a nice tradition," Oz says. "The dinner, not the grubs."

 

 

They've come up on the visitor's center, and on to Main Street.

 

 

"Stop me if I get too maudlin."

 

 

"What, just because you talk about Evan? It doesn't bother me, unless it bothers you. Sounds like he was a major part of your life. So if I want to get to know you, I should be cool with hearing about him, right?"

 

 

"Okay, then." That sweet smile has emerged, and Oz wonders how Evan could have failed to find chemistry as well as friendship. She points. "This is a nice place for lunch, and we're not underdressed for it."

 

 

"Sure, looks good."

 

 

Big spatters of rain are hitting the windshield by the time she pulls into a parking space. As they race for the entrance of the cafe, a distant flash lights the sky. Alice seizes his arm and only lets go once they're inside. She repeats her request to the hostess not to be near any windows, and they're seated in the middle of the dining room.

 

 

"Sorry," Alice says as they settle in and open their menus. "I was hit by lightning when I was a kid."

 

 

"Okay," Oz says. "That? Was unexpected."

 

 

A flicker of the smile. "Yeah, for me too. I mean, as lightning strikes go, it was pretty indirect. I was touching something that got hit, and was knocked to my knees. My ears rang for a few days, but I was more scared than hurt."

 

 

"Wow, though. That's ... elemental." Which sounds completely stupid to his ears, but she seems to know what he means. "Did you ever paint it?"

 

 

"No," she says, and it seems to strike her for the first time that this is odd. "You'd think I would have. Now I really want to." Oz recognizes her expression, knows that _now_ is about as immediate as it gets. He's known that creative charge that makes you want to be doing something right this minute. He's felt that way about writing songs, but it's been a while.

 

 

She nibbles at her lower lip. "My father blamed everything he didn't like about me on that. It's weird, he rewrote our whole history. To hear him tell it, I was the perfect son before that, and everything changed in that moment. But I was left with _my_ view of history, which was that he was never happy with me, and I was never happy being anyone's son."

 

 

"It's hard to try hanging onto your own reality when everyone around you has a different one," Oz says. "You have to choose which one you're going to honor, and it's painful either way."

 

 

"Yeah," she says. "Not many people get that."

 

 

Oz gets that.

 

 

***

 

 

Alice recommends the sandwich with goat cheese, peppers and kalamata olives, which they both order with salad and iced tea. Once the server takes their menus and goes, Alice says, "So you haven't said a thing about anyone in _your_ life. I know you were in a band. I'm assuming the others weren't raccoons."

 

 

Oz raises an eyebrow. "Raccoons?"

 

 

Alice shrugs. "I like random raccoon references. Inherently funny." Lightning flashes blue-white, the boom just a heartbeat behind, and Alice jumps. "_Shit!_" she whispers.

 

 

Alice is right; she's done more of the heavy lifting in the personal revelation department. Not only that, she could use a little diversion right now.

 

 

"I've been kinda on my own for a while," Oz tells her. "Though I did run into a high-school friend in Madagascar."

 

 

Alice assumes a deadpan expression. "As one will do."

 

 

Oz grins. "We came from a town full of weird events. It seemed kind of inevitable. So we traveled around together for a while."

 

 

"What was your friend doing in Madagascar?"

 

 

"Going from place to place, building shelters and animal pens and that kind of thing. Collecting folk stories." That was the official version anyway. "I was doing something similar, without the carpentry work, which is better for all concerned."

 

 

"You told me about the transformation stories. What was your friend looking for?"

 

 

"Stories of girls with unusual strength."

 

 

The food comes and they dig in. Alice was right about the sandwiches. "I think it's kind of wild that two guys from the same high school ended up in Madagascar looking for folk stories."

 

 

"I guess you're right. My friends there, we were all friendly with the school librarian. He had a pretty big influence."

 

 

"Do you keep in touch with him?"

 

 

Oz shakes his head. "Xander still does. That's the friend. In fact, they're working together now, for a different organization."

 

 

Alice regards him for a long moment. "Okay, I have zero evidence to back this up, but you don't seem like the kind of guy who drops his friends without a backward glance. Why? Beats me, just intuition, I guess."

 

 

Her intuition is a lot more amazing than she'd expect. "Well, a few years back, I left town for the first time. I -- " He looks across the dining room toward the window, where pelting rain is running down the glass. "I was going through some stuff, so I went off to try to deal with it. When I got back, things had changed so much I couldn't see a place for myself there anymore. My girlfriend had moved on in a big way, and being confronted with that loss, it made me into someone I didn't like being. And I kind of blamed her, which was not cool. So I left again."

 

 

Alice falls silent, dividing her attention between her sandwich and the rain outside, and Oz thinks he's done a crap job of distracting her from the weather. He flips through his mental rolodex of topics, and can only come up with, "Do you think Sam has figured out there's a werewolf in town by now?" and "I keep thinking about kissing you," so he keeps quiet.

 

 

When she dials back in on Oz, her gaze is disconcertingly direct. "So are you settled here now, or next time you have something to deal with, will you be leaving town?"

 

_That sort of depends on Sam and whether he plans to kill me_, Oz thinks, but he can't exactly say that. "I'm done moving," he says at last, meeting her gaze just as intently. "Unless I'm with someone who wants to move too."

 

 

"Good," she says softly. "That's good to know."

 

 

***

 

 

Alice seems to decide her question had pushed things along a little too far or too fast. She pulls the conversation back a bit, asking him about his favorite types of music.

 

 

"I pretty much like everything," Oz says. "And I don't say that because I'm one of those annoyingly vague people you can't pin down."

 

 

"Yet the effect is the same." The sweet/impish smile emerges.

 

 

Oz has the sudden thought that he wouldn't mind being pinned down by Alice at all. He takes a long drink of iced tea to shove that thought back.

 

 

"Rap," she says, with a tone of challenge.

 

 

He inhales some tea, coughs and splutters. "Here?"

 

 

"No. Though --" the smile deepens. There are dimples. "No. It's just so many people who 'like everything' add 'except rap' or 'except country.'"

 

 

"I get it. I like Kanye. I think he's almost as brilliant as he thinks he is."

 

 

"Wow. Pretty extravagant praise. Okay, you already said your band used to play some country. What songs?"

 

 

"The only one that stuck was a pretty obscure one by Merle Haggard called 'I Can't Hold Myself in Line.' Bluesy more than country, and full of self-loathing and despair. We kind of ramped it up to fit in better with our sound, so it pretty much sucked when we got done with it."

 

 

"Please tell me you have some of this on CD. I have to hear what you guys sounded like. Was it? Guys? Or did you have some women in the band?"

 

 

"It was your standard testosterone-laced rock and roll cliche."

 

 

"I don't believe anything you do is --" Another lightning strike makes her jump, and the thunder rolls on for quite a while. "God. This is going to go on all day."

 

 

"No, I don't think so. What makes you feel better when this happens?"

 

 

"Buckets of wine. Which isn't such a hot idea considering the drive back."

 

 

Oz's mind leaps at an idea. "How about this? We get you buckets of wine and we stay over. I promise you I'm not making a cheesy move. We'll get two rooms. _I'll_ get two rooms, since it was my idea coming up here in the first place." He has an emergency credit card. Which two rooms up here may well come close to maxing out, considering the fuckers at the bank have lowered his credit limit because he almost never uses it. It would be a ridiculous expense, given that he's not going to be sleeping in his room, but worth it if it puts her mind at ease about his trustworthiness.

 

 

"Daniel, you are the sweetest man I've met in a very long time."

 

 

He has a pretty good idea who he's being compared to. He just hopes she doesn't have the same sort of sexless fondness for him that she did for Evan.

 

 

"But it's really too extravagant," she adds.

 

 

"I want you not to be miserable. That doesn't strike me as pointless excess." He stands. "Stay here. I'll get everything arranged."

 

 

He thanks whatever power sent the storm as he heads for the hostess' desk to ask about a phone. One night off of Sam's radar, and Alice doesn't have to know a thing.

 

 

***

 

 

"Check it out," Oz says as he opens the door. "Sitting room, bedroom, bedroom." He'd point -- middle, left, right -- but Alice has her fingernails dug into his upper arm.

 

 

"Sofa, window," she adds, apparently disconcerted by their relative proximity.

 

 

"Unless they've nailed it down, that's a problem with a solution." He slips his forearm around to her back, just long enough to give an encouraging touch, not enough to be creepy. "Pick your bedroom, I'll move the furniture."

 

 

"Don't be ridiculous." She slings her bag down on a chair and helps him rearrange the room so the sofa's backed against a wall rather than the bay window.

 

 

"Okay," Oz says once she looks happier about the orientation of everything in the room. "I'll run down to the car for the wine. Gonna be okay?"

 

 

"Oh hell, Daniel. I'm sorry to make such a --"

 

 

Oz holds up a hand. "Hey. We are beyond cool. It's pretty fierce out there." The skies have darkened, so much so that he's going to have to keep an eye on his watch to see when he needs to get himself out of the inn and into the woods. He's got a few of hours of grace, anyway.

 

 

"I know. If it wasn't sheltered parking, I wouldn't let you go out there."

 

 

"I'll make it fast."

 

 

He's back in a few minutes, and by then Alice has staked her claim on a bedroom. "You get the one with the French doors. There's a little balcony out there."

 

 

"Doesn't your room connect to it?"

 

 

"Yeah, but the door's half as big, and the bed's farther away."

 

 

"You're probably wanting to get started on the buckets of wine," Oz says. "Sit. Let me do it."

 

 

Alice settles on the sofa, one leg tucked up under her, her back to the bay window.

 

 

"I'm sorry," Oz says as he hands her a glass of red wine. He sits facing her, his glass half as full as hers.

 

 

"For what?"

 

 

"I brought you here."

 

 

"_Pff._ Please. Are you going to take responsibility for the weather too?"

 

 

He thinks about something Sam said, that weird weather patterns are often signs of demonic activity. This is a particularly intense storm -- but no, Oz is no demon, and he's never triggered anything unusual in the climate. He offers Alice a smile. "Only credit for the perfect days."

 

 

She returns it, laced with that sweetness that just pierces him through. "Today was damn close. Even with the weather." She unbends the arm she has cocked on the back of the sofa, brushes his shoulder with the fingers she'd been winding in her own hair. Oz feels a little thrill on his skin, imagining that it's the crackle of electricity still running through Alice's body.

 

 

"I've never kissed a girl who was struck by lightning," he says.

 

 

"We can take care of that right now," Alice says.

 

 

Among the sounds Oz loves best in the world is that rustle and sigh of a sofa or car seat when its two occupants are leaning in for their first kiss. Layered with the rise and fall of breath and the soft sound of lips meeting, that first promising taste before urgency and tongues. It's been a long time, and he closes his eyes to listen for this subtle music.

 

 

"Wow," he breathes as they separate.

 

 

"Yeah," she agrees. Her fingers feather along his lips and jaw and cheek. Definitely electricity.

 

 

It takes an effort to say, "Don't rush things along just because we're here and the storm has you thrown off balance. Things will happen when it's right."

 

 

"Right," she murmurs, and leans in for another electric kiss.

 

 

***

 

 

They let it stay at this level for a while -- "just lips" doesn't begin to do it justice. Their lips roam to spots that aren't other lips: cheeks and eyes and earlobes, fingers, palms and necks.

 

 

Just around the time tongue and hands join the party, another blue-white flash shows the room in bright X-ray contrast. Alice emits a particularly fervent "Oh hell" and reaches for her wine glass. When she's downed it, Oz pours her another.

 

 

As he settles beside her again, he draws her close, and Alice shifts to rest her head on his shoulder. He suspects he looks a little ridiculous, considering she's so much taller than him, but she tucks up both legs and sighs against his shoulder, and Oz doesn't care what it looks like.

 

 

As the storm picks up in intensity again, she works on her medicinal wine. Oz allows himself only an occasional sip. By the time the storm is waning, Alice is lying curled on her side with her head in his lap, as he sings softly and strokes her hair.

 

 

"That's pretty," she says sleepily after one song. "What is it?"

 

 

"Old Johnny Cash song. 'I Still Miss Someone.'"

 

 

"Do you?"

 

 

"It's kind of like this storm. Fierce for a while, but rolling away."

 

 

"Someone was an idiot, not waiting for a guy like you."

 

 

Oz smiles. "We were pretty young. Time moves differently when you're a college freshman."

 

 

"Mm, yeah. Me too. Wasn't college, though. Police academy."

 

 

That piece of information rockets through him, surprising, but not. Oz recalls the painting of the cop with a black band over his badge -- a sign of mourning for a fallen officer, he suddenly recalls. His subconscious mind must have been chewing on that for a while to come up with that fact, undoubtedly learned from a dozen or more articles in the _Sunnydale Herald_. He thinks of the painting of the stone angel cradling the gun in his hands. _There's a certain mindset_, Alice had told him. Oz has discovered it too, a truth the world over, as a drifter who occasionally catches the attention of the police. He thinks of her trying to fit herself into that mold, when she doesn't fit into what a lot of people consider the most basic mold. (It's the first thing they ask, the minute a baby emerges into the world: _boy or girl?_)

 

_Time moves differently._ Struggles and sorrows feel like they'll last forever. Oz has an intuitive flash about what happened back then, but he doesn't want to ask Alice about that now. She's too tipsy to decide whether she really wants to tell this -- she might even be sorry to know she'd let this much slip. Strange how he'd been in a similar position with Sam last night, and had no such qualms about letting him reveal more of himself than he might have without the aid of herbs and alcohol.

 

 

Oz rubs his hand along Alice's arm. "Hey," he says softly. "I think you should get to bed before I have to try carrying you."

 

 

"Mm," she says with a tone of complaint, but she allows him to urge her to her feet.

 

 

Oz helps her to the bed in her chosen room, spreading the covers over her, brushing her hair out of her eyes. "Anything else you need?" he asks softly.

 

 

"Mm, no."

 

 

He kisses her gently on the temple and leaves the room, closing her door behind him. Oz checks his watch, then sucks a breath in through his teeth.

 

_Oh, hell._

 

 

***

 

_Twenty-five minutes._ That's all the time Oz has left himself to get deep enough into the woods to be safe.

 

 

Not "safe" as in "not in danger." "Safe" as in "not dangerous."

 

 

Oz closes two bedroom doors between himself and Alice, then slips out the French doors and lowers himself off the balcony onto the ground below. The ground is wet enough to cause his feet to slip as he lands, and he feels a twinge in his back as he rights himself.

 

_Shit shit shit._ The rhythm of the word matches that of his pounding feet as he tries to make the shelter of the woods. The sounds are softened, swallowed by the loud hiss of rain. Maybe the rain will keep people and animals out of harm's way.

 

 

His wolf's nose picks up the smell of old fires and the smoldering of new lightning strikes. He heads for the denser forest, veering off the trails and into the tangle of underbrush and deadfall. Wet clothes make the itching of his skin even more prickly and unpleasant, and soon the ache in his teeth and jaws sets in. The pain of transformation takes its familiar course as Oz tries his best to outrun it, until his toe catches a root, sending him crashing to the ground. He stays there as he rides out the agonies in his joints and muscles, and then Oz gives way to Wolf.

 

 

***

 

 

He wakes shivering and aware of the differences between _hurt_ and _ache_ and _smart_ and _throb_. He sits up on a carpet of yellowed tamarack needles (adding a little _stab_ into the mix) and checks out the assortment of bruises, scrapes and scratches on his bare skin. As he reaches up to rub his face, a fiery pain flares across his shoulder.

 

 

Oz wonders what time it is. He remembered to take off his watch and flip it onto the bed as he was leaving the inn last night, so it's not lost, but it's no use. Sunrise was at 5:41, so it's sometime after that. Early still, he's pretty sure. The sooner he gets his naked ass back to his room, the less explaining he has to do.

 

 

He gets to his feet and begins picking his way over uneven ground, back toward the smells of civilization. The storm has moved off sometime in the night, so he has to dodge a few people as he nears the inn, but there isn't too much life yet. Oz finds their balcony and clambers up the rainspout until he can reach over and pull himself onto the railing.

 

 

As Oz swings one leg over the railing, he finds himself looking right at Alice, who's sitting at a little metal table with a newspaper and a mug of coffee.

 

 

She rises to her feet, without seeming to realize she's doing so. "Daniel?"

 

 

***

 

 

Oz freezes. "Hey, Alice."

 

 

"What the hell?"

 

 

He swings his other leg over the railing, trying to be casual about it as he flashes her the full frontal. "I guess ... I guess I was sleepwalking. I woke up in the woods."

 

 

"You do that much?"

 

 

"Sleepwalk? Uh, no. More when I was a teenager, but once in a while..." He rubs his hand over his face. "I, uh, excuse me. I think I'll get dressed."

 

 

"You're all scratched up," Alice protests. "You can't just throw on clothes over that."

 

 

"Right. I'll take a quick shower." He wipes the mud off his feet on the mat outside the French doors, then hurries through them before she can question him, grateful her line of sight doesn't show her the interior of his room and the undisturbed bedclothes.

 

 

The hot water soothes his bruises, but the scratches on his arms and legs sting, and the fire in his shoulder flares up like dry tinder. Oz feels vaguely woozy, and _hungry_, which fills him with relief.

 

 

When he emerges, he pulls his change of clothes from the messenger bag he'd brought. Jeans identical to the ones he'd worn yesterday, and a t-shirt in the same dark blue. He turns it inside-out to disguise the difference in the image on the shirt front.

 

 

Alice is still on the balcony when he barefoots it out there. A second mug of coffee sits on the table. "I poured it when I heard the shower cut off, so it's hot."

 

 

"Thanks, Alice." He eases himself into the chair across from her.

 

 

She frowns. "Are you okay?"

 

 

"I, um, lost my shoes. Out there somewhere, I guess."

 

 

"You put your shoes on to sleepwalk naked in the woods?"

 

 

Oz shrugs, and immediately regrets it. "I've done weirder, some nights."

 

 

"You're hurt." She starts up from her seat, but Oz raises a hand to stop her.

 

 

"Wait. This isn't the morning I wanted to have." _Understatement by a factor of twelve_, he thinks. "Things happened last night. Before the walkabout, I mean. And I wanted to ... honor that. I don't want to derail it just because I went wandering out into the woods in my sleep. It was good, I want to say that. I'm sorry the storm wigged you out, but it was a nice night." He has a sip of coffee, which makes his stomach growl. "How are you this morning? Did you sleep okay?"

 

 

"I slept fine," Alice tells him. "You were very sweet, tucking me in."

 

 

"I guess here's where someone has to take the risk, be the first to put it out there. I'm good with a certain amount of risk, so -- I hope we can go on."

 

 

The sweetness of her smile just kills him. "I'd like that, Daniel." She scoots her chair closer to his and leans in for a coffee-flavored kiss.

 

 

***

 

 

Like the night before, one kiss leads them into more kisses, but they don't get too far into a necking session before Oz's stomach growls again, more insistently this time.

 

 

They both laugh softly as they separate.

 

 

"I kinda hoped I wouldn't completely lose my dignity until later on," Oz says.

 

 

"Where we're headed, we've got to abandon dignity sooner or later. At least if we're going to do it right." She traces his lips with her fingers and gives them a soft peck. "I have a plan. We need breakfast, you need shoes. I can run out and get you something to wear so you can leave the room, then we can go out to breakfast. Or I can bring back shoes and breakfast and we can stay in the room until checkout time."

 

 

"I like the second one," Oz says. "Cheap pair of sneakers at the nearest discount store works just fine."

 

 

Alice asks for his size.

 

 

Oz tells her, and adds, "No direct correlation." His feet are embarrassingly small.

 

 

She gives him the sweet liberally flavored with wicked. "I already know that." She lays another kiss on him and then rises. "Back in half an hour at the very latest. I'd tell you to get a little sleep, but I don't have a chain with me."

 

 

Once she's gone, Oz stretches out on the sofa to follow her suggestion, trying to find a comfortable position. He doesn't, but manages to fall asleep anyway.

 

 

***

 

 

When Alice returns, she hands Oz a bag with a shoebox inside. "I didn't know if you lost your socks too, so I got a pair."

 

 

"Thanks, yeah, I hadn't thought to say."

 

 

"I'll set things up out on the balcony. Why don't you get another pot going in the coffeemaker?" She rustles through the other bag she brought in, coming up with a small packet of coffee. "This should be a bit better than the in-room stuff."

 

 

She carries the rest out to the balcony as Oz heads for the coffee maker, and by the time he gets it brewing, she's got everything set out. Orange juice, fresh fruit, with scones and croissants piled on a paper plate. "Jesus, Daniel, while I was out there shopping you wouldn't believe some of the stuff I heard. There was a coyote or wolf or something out in the woods last night, they said, scaring the crap out of some campers. You could've run into it while you were out there asleep. There was also some stupid asshole out there shooting in the dark. He claims he shot the thing, but it ran deeper into the woods, so nobody knows how badly they hurt it."

 

 

"Wow," Oz says, piling some food onto the paper plate in front of him. Normally this would be perfect, but today he's starving for some meat, the rarer the better. He contents himself with an extra croissant, this one filled with chocolate. "No one got hurt? Other than the coyote, I mean."

 

 

"No. But it could have been bad. Especially for you."

 

 

He nods.

 

 

"I'll stop now, because I'm beginning to sound like my mother, which freaks me out even more than thinking of you out there last night."

 

 

Alice's sense of humor is back, which is a relief.

 

 

They eat breakfast with pauses for kisses, followed by kissing with pauses for breakfast. It's all going extremely well when Alice grabs him by the shoulder and he sucks in a hiss of breath. She startles, drawing back, and looks at her hand, which is smeared with blood.

 

 

"What the hell, Daniel. You're bleeding."

 

 

***

 

 

"Get your shirt off," Alice orders him. "I want to have a peek." She silences his protests with a look, and Oz carefully eases out of his tee.

 

 

She draws in a breath with a sound like the one Oz made a moment before. "For god's sake, Daniel. Why didn't you say something?"

 

 

"It's just a deep scrape. It's in a bad spot where I can't really see, but I think I must've gouged it on a branch or something."

 

 

"Try a bullet or something. Fuck, Daniel. You're lucky to be walking around. It's a graze, otherwise -- I'm taking you to the hospital."

 

 

"No," he blurts. "I don't want to be explaining how I was wandering around the woods bare-ass naked. Like you said, it's just a graze."

 

 

"You still need to have it looked after. It needs to be cleaned carefully, and they'd probably give you antibiotics."

 

 

"I've got stuff at home. Stinky herbs, you remember. I get banged up sometimes when I'm out hiking. I take care of a lot of things myself."

 

 

Alice scowls. "This is completely different."

 

 

"Look," Oz says. "I don't mean to be argumentative, but I had a very bad experience at a hospital." _Hospital, government lab -- close enough._ "You want to knock me unconscious and drag me there, that's the only way I'll go."

 

 

"Daniel, nobody likes the hospital."

 

 

"I was lucky to come out alive," he responds.

 

 

Alice eyes him for a moment. "You won't change your mind?"

 

 

"Not for this. Sam was worse off when he showed up, and I handled that."

 

 

"Mind if I point out that you could actually _see_ what you were about?"

 

 

"Depends. Is that an observation or an offer?"

 

 

"I wouldn't willingly subject myself to the stinky herbs for just anyone, but you're on the short list."

 

 

"There's no call to get personal," Oz deadpans.

 

 

Alice laughs, as Oz hoped she would, and he suddenly feels better about everything.

 

 

"Okay," she says. "Just let me clean that and fake some kind of bandage, and when we get back, I'll do a proper job."

 

 

***

 

 

The ride back to Lone Pine isn't entirely comfortable, only partially because of the battering Oz's body took last night. He chews his lip, wondering how much he can tell Alice about what's really going on. Starting things off with a metric shitload of lies, not so good. But ... either path he takes, honesty or secrecy, feels like it has a big yellow "dead end" sign at the beginning.

 

 

"You're very quiet," Alice eventually says.

 

 

"You're just now noticing?"

 

 

She cracks a smile. "For you, even."

 

 

"Yeah." He takes a deep breath, seems unable to let it back out. "There's a thing. If I lie about it, I probably screw everything up. If I tell the truth, I may well screw everything up."

 

 

Alice takes one hand off the wheel and places it on Oz's knee. "Been there, done that."

 

 

"Yeah."

 

 

She waits patiently through the next pause while Oz searches for words.

 

 

"So. I told you about a thing I have for transformation stories from all over the world. You said you wanted to hear one sometime."

 

 

Alice casts a bemused look his way. "I do."

 

 

"Well, I've got one for you now."

 

 

***

 

 

"Should I pull off the road so I can give you my full attention?" Alice asks.

 

 

"Partial is good," Oz says. "Partial is perfect."

 

 

Alice rubs her hand over his knee, then settles it back on the steering wheel. It's not a come-on, but a gesture of encouragement.

 

 

"It's kind of a Michael Landon thing. Except not so much angels and pioneers and cowboys." No. This is not the time to be cryptic and flippant and cool.

 

 

"You have totally lost me."

 

 

"It's all right, I kinda lost myself." Oz watches the scenery flow past his window for a moment. "Maybe I -- let's go back to the stories. Some legends aren't just metaphors. Or some story a primitive people creates to make sense of the world."

 

 

"Okay."

 

 

"Supernatural stuff -- it exists. I've seen a lot of it." _I am it_, he thinks.

 

 

She waits for what he's going to say next. So does Oz.

 

 

"There was this incident a few years ago. I was bitten by something --" Oz flinches. _If Jordy's a "something," so am I._ "By someone. Three nights a month, that someone was -- is -- " He takes a deep breath. "A werewolf. So that means three nights a month, _I'm_ a werewolf."

 

 

Alice releases a breath. "_That_ Michael Landon thing."

 

 

"Um, yeah. So. Full moon last night."

 

 

"That thing the campers saw --"

 

 

Oz flinches again at _thing_. "Was me."

 

 

"I've got to pull off," Alice says, and slows the car to a stop by the side of the road.

 

 

Great. There's nothing like inspiring puke to make you glad you shared your innermost secrets. But Alice doesn't fling open her door and retch; she just sits there with her hands on the wheel. She lets out another breath in a soft _whuff_.

 

 

"It's, um, kind of big," Oz admits. "And --" Long pause. "It sounds kind of crazy."

 

 

"Well, yeah. But --" She turns toward him and he's struck by the deep blue of her eyes -- has he seriously never noticed their ocean-dark color before? "There was a time when telling someone I wasn't really a man at all and had born into a male body by mistake would have landed me in the psych ward. So I guess I can listen. Were you born -- no, you said you were bitten. When did that happen?"

 

 

"I was in high school."

 

 

"And you were attacked? Was it bad?"

 

 

Oz shakes his head. "It wasn't exactly an attack. It was my cousin. He was just a kid, but he'd been infected. We were rassling around, and he took exception to being tickled. He bit me and drew blood. He wasn't even wolfed out." It occurs to him that it's been years since he asked after Jordy, and he's struck with a strong pang of guilt. Did he ever find a way to live with his curse? "I tried all kinds of ways to cure myself. I've consulted shamans and monks and witch doctors, but I haven't uncovered any permanent cure. I minimize the danger by going off into the wilderness for three days and nights. I give myself time to get far enough away from people that they're safe and I am too."

 

 

"Except last night --"

 

 

"And the night before. I tried to take off but I didn't get far either night. So, animal mutilations night before last, and scared campers last night."

 

 

"And tonight?"

 

 

"I think as soon as we get back, I need to get in my van and head somewhere remote. After daybreak tomorrow, I'll be okay. For a month." He turns back to her. "So. I don't know how -- I've never had to ask before, because my last girlfriend saw the transformation. Do you believe any of this?"

 

 

"_This_ is a pretty abstract thing. I believe _you_. I know you're not a liar."

 

 

A surge of relief rushes through him, but another thought cuts it short. "I guess there's one other thing I have to ask, but you don't need to answer now. Does this -- Are we --"

 

 

"Can a selkie and a werewolf find romance under the pale moonlight?" she offers.

 

 

"Something like that."

 

 

"Well, let's find out."

 

 

Oz closes his eyes, letting out a breath.

 

 

"Huh," he hears Alice say.

 

 

"What?"

 

 

"That guy Sam just drove by, headed up toward Mammoth Lakes. He was wearing a jacket and tie."

 

 

***

 

 

"Jesus," Oz says under his breath.

 

 

"What?"

 

 

"He's onto me. Or maybe not _me_ yet, but he's heard about what happened last night. He's going up there to poke around, ask questions."

 

 

Alice frowns. "Why?"

 

 

"He's a hunter. That's what they call themselves, but what it means is people who go after supernatural stuff. I've run into them before, and they're not so much interested in grey areas or mitigating factors."

 

 

"What do you mean, 'go after'?"

 

 

"What you're thinking. They're hunters. They do what hunters do. When Sam finds out what I am, he'll want to kill me."

 

 

"Daniel, that's murder!"

 

 

"Not by his standards. As far as hunters are concerned, I'm a killer and I need to be put down before I kill anyone else. And if you don't mind, I'd feel a whole lot better if we were on the move right now."

 

 

"Sure, sure." Alice starts the engine again and pulls back onto the highway. She's quiet for a good while before she asks, "Have you?"

 

 

"Killed a person? Only once. It was another werewolf, and she was going to kill my girlfriend." Oz squints out at the rugged landscape flashing by his window. "If I'm honest with myself, it was a kind of twisted self-defense. She -- Veruca -- the other werewolf -- wanted me to embrace what I am instead of trying to contain it. She was offering this really seductive freedom, and if I joined her --" He shakes his head. "I'd have become what Sam thinks I am."

 

 

"I can't imagine that," Alice says flatly.

 

 

"I could. I was twenty."

 

 

She reaches over and runs her hand through his hair, just a fleeting contact before she returns her hand to the wheel. "Some day we'll have to compare notes about twenty."

 

 

He'd like to think there'll be a some day, but he's not so sure.

 

 

***

 

 

"I'm sorry," Oz says.

 

 

"Don't start in on that again."

 

 

"Yeah, well, this time I'm not apologizing for the weather. My instincts are all screwed up. Every decision I've made since Sam showed up has been a mistake. I wanted to be sure you'd be out of danger, and instead --"

 

 

"Daniel --"

 

 

"What?"

 

 

"You're hysterical, aren't you? I mean, on most people I'd read it as consternation, but since it's you, I'm going with hysteria."

 

 

Oz scowls. "This isn't funny."

 

 

"Definitely hysteria." She throws him a sidelong glance. "I'm sorry. I know. But I'm not worried about myself. If you're right, he's not interested in me. We'll get you out of his path, and things will be okay."

 

 

He can't bring himself to believe it, and despite Alice's attempts to distract him on the ride back, he lapses into silence. When they finally pull into town, she asks, "Do you need to stop by your place and get anything?"

 

 

"No, I've got supplies in the van."

 

 

"What about the first aid? I was going to --"

 

 

"Look," he snaps. "A bullet furrow's not going to matter if I don't survive the night." He rubs a hand over his face. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to --"

 

 

"I know, Daniel. Where _is_ your van, anyway?"

 

 

Oz directs her to the spot where he'd parked it, and she pulls the Mini in behind it. Turning toward him, she touches his face. "Do you have time to get enough distance?"

 

 

"I think so. You be safe."

 

 

"I'm fine. And everything's going to be okay, I promise you." Alice leans in to kiss him, and he hears that soft rustle of fabric against upholstery that makes it seem like everything could be all right. "You're a guy who's with a girl who was hit by lightning. I'm convinced that's pretty big mojo."

 

 

He smiles and steals another kiss. "Hope you're right." Oz slips out of her car and gets into his van, heading for the heart of the desert.

 

 

***

 

 

When Oz pulls the van over and steps outside, he feels his wolf leap up within him at the familiar scents that say he's nearing Oz's favored full moon haunt. It's the scent of freedom, the chance to run and hunt without the shadow of the human's anxiety lingering in his head.

 

 

Oz sets out on foot, with another ninety minutes to walk to find his three-days-a-month home. Half an hour into the hike, he stashes his bag with clothes and water in its usual hiding place, and peels off most of his clothes. His shoes he'll keep on until transformation time is near.

 

 

It's not just his wolf; Oz does love this place. The lowest, driest, hottest place in the States. But it's more than that, it's full of life of various kinds: the jackrabbits with their crazy ears and the ravens who seem just like the mythological creatures some peoples have made of them -- protector and trickster, fascinated with humans and involved with them.

 

 

Thinking of the Raven, of course, makes him think of Sam. Mixed in with the apprehension is a certain amount of pity -- he's in a bad place, and Oz understands that. But he knows that makes Sam incredibly dangerous.

 

 

The familiar onset of wild itching and bone-deep aches overtakes him, and Oz pulls off his shoes. A jackrabbit stares at him and then runs as if it knows what he truly is.

 

 

And after a wrenching moment, he is exactly the thing that sent the rabbit scrambling for its life.

 

 

***

 

 

He awakens with the sunrise, sticky with sweat. At this time of year, it barely drops below ninety degrees at night. Oz takes a moment to fully sense his body, checking for small injuries and muscle strains. He's not hungry, but not covered in blood, so whatever he hunted and killed is likely to be small. This last night of the wolf moon, at least, he's managed to fly under the radar. He drinks his fill from the freshwater stream near his sleeping place, then sets out for the van.

 

 

As he walks, Oz finds his shoes, which he takes as another good omen. They're scattered, and one's been chewed a bit by a curious animal, but they're intact enough to wear. He shakes them to dislodge any snoozing scorpions that might've crashed for the day, and laces them on.

 

 

He finds his clothes and water, pausing only long enough to dress and drink. _P.S. HYDRATE!!_, he thinks as he twists the cap off the bottle, and it makes him laugh. Makes him think of Alice, his selkie-girl who knows about him and takes it all in stride. Makes him think of new beginnings.

 

 

A snatch of song comes to him as he walks, and he knows it's a new one, a song about Alice. This happens to him in the desert sometimes; he comes out with a new song half written. He keeps a notepad and an old microcassette recorder in the van to capture the early scraps of tune and lyrics.

 

 

He's preoccupied with the song as he approaches the van, so the shadowy shape within the vehicle's boxy shade doesn't register until it moves. A tall, lanky figure gets to its feet, steps forward into the light.

 

 

"Nice morning for a stroll in the desert," says Sam.

 

 

***

 

 

Oz's wolf goes completely still. "If you ask me, it's getting a bit hot out here."

 

 

"Look, why don't we save a lot of time and skip the dancing around," Sam says. "You know what I am, and I know what you are."

 

 

"Why don't we not save all that time by making assumptions," Oz says carefully. "Tell me what you think you know about me."

 

 

Sam does not seem impressed with his dedication to truth over the mental quick-draw, giving him exasperation. "You're a werewolf."

 

 

"Wow," Oz says. "Got any proof?"

 

 

"It's too late for the 'Really? _Werewolves_?' act," Sam says. "You're the one who mentioned hunters with necklaces made of werewolf teeth. You can't play dumb now."

 

 

"Still," Oz says. "Got any proof?"

 

 

"You've had experience with hunters. Plenty of people meet them, but few ever know what they are, much less realize it immediately."

 

 

"I think I mentioned growing up in a supernatural hot zone."

 

 

"That's right, you did. You've been gone the last two nights. Maybe the last three, I was a little out of it that first night." His tone makes it clear he has a pretty good idea who's responsible for that.

 

 

"I had plans. If we want to start spinning wild stories out of very little evidence, let's make something out of you suddenly appearing in the middle of the desert."

 

 

Sam ghosts a smile. "My car's tucked in there right behind your van. It was easy to see which way you'd be coming."

 

 

"Disappointing. I had a much more colorful theory. That's what happens, though. Real life takes the air right out of a good story." Oz takes a careful step forward. "I've got some water in the van, and I could use a drink right now."

 

 

Nodding, Sam produces a pistol from the small of his back. It's not, Oz notices, the one he'd taken off Sam the day he collapsed. "Open the van, then show me where it is and step back. Drop that pack first."

 

 

Oz lets his bag drop at his feet, then moves carefully toward the van. He does as Sam instructed, and Sam hands him a bottle of water from the small cooler. Oz hadn't had time to pour some ice into the cooler before he took off; the water's the approximate temperature of a cup of hot tea. It's water, though, and he drinks.

 

 

"There was a cattle mutilation out this way the other night, but closer to town," Sam says. "Next night, there was some kind of animal scaring the campers up at Mammoth Lakes."

 

 

"Huh," Oz says.

 

 

"You knew I was checking out the cattle mutilation. You ran in the opposite direction."

 

 

"Like I said, I had plans."

 

 

"Then last night, back out this way. Only this time well out into the desert, as if you made it farther than you managed the other night. By the way, you've got a leak in that van. You might want to get that checked, this is no place to be having a breakdown."

 

_Shit._ Piece of shit van. He usually checked it over before each full moon trip, but this month he'd been too harried to take his time. "Not much of a place for prolonged discussions, either," Oz points out. "I got a bad case of heatstroke a couple of years back, and I'd really like to get out of this."

 

 

"Not such a bad idea," Sam agrees. "Hands against the van, feet back." In pretty short order, Oz has his hands bound behind him with plastic handcuffs like the riot police use.

 

 

"You've gotta be shitting me," Oz says.

 

 

Sam says nothing, just marches him to the black Chevy behind Oz's van.

 

 

***

 

 

Oz shifts, looking for a more comfortable position. It becomes clear fast that he's not going to find it, as long as his hands are bound behind him. "I don't mean to critique your style," he says to Sam, "but moving me _from_ the remote spot to kill me seems a little counterintuitive."

 

 

Not even a flicker in Sam's grim expression. "I thought we should have a conversation first."

 

_First._ "Well, it's nice to have a little foreplay."

 

 

"Look," Sam says testily. "I'm as surprised as you are that I didn't shoot you before you made it to the van. Let's keep the smartass remarks to a minimum." He turns the car onto a barely visible dirt track and drives another ten minutes or so.

 

 

Oz gazes out his window, his spirits as bleak as the landscape. More so -- he knows from experience how much life there is out here, subtle as it is. He had just found his way out of the deep freeze he'd been living in, and life was looking like it would get good. Now he's going to die without seeing Alice again. He wishes he could spare her another heartbreak in a life full of them. Part of him wants to rail that this is not fair, not for either of him, but he's never believed life is terribly fair. You can't be that stupid, growing up in Sunnydale.

 

 

He spots a shape shimmering in the distance, which resolves itself into a tin-roofed structure of some kind. An abandoned cabin, it looks like, far from the ghost towns in this area.

 

 

Sam pulls the Chevy up in front of the building. "Found this while I was scouting around the area. At least we can talk without getting sunstroke."

 

 

Oz wonders again why they're talking at all. If Sam believes werewolves have to die, what's the point of prolonging things? Sam gets him out of the car into the building, where he's treated to the strong odors of rodent shit and piss. He'd rather die out in the open, with his wolf scenting the subtle smells of the desert as his life pumps out of him. He'd rather have his bones scattered over the landscape by carrion eaters -- it seems only fair, considering how much hunting he's done here himself.

 

 

Sam's lip curls at the stink and drifts of rat turds. "That chair there," he says, gesturing with the gun.

 

 

Oz moves to obey, then looks up at Sam. "Just -- don't let me die here, okay? Do it out there."

 

 

"How long have you lived in Lone Pine?" Sam asks.

 

 

"Couple of years now. What else do you want to know -- hobbies? What I do for a living?"

 

 

Sam ignores all but the answer to his question. "Pretty difficult to blend in, isn't it? Hunting seems pretty limited, and it would be hard to escape notice besides."

 

 

"You've been tracking me. You can't really believe I hunt where I live."

 

 

"It's pretty uninhabited out here. By people, I mean."

 

 

Oz nods. "Which is why I moved close by."

 

 

"I did some checking. There haven't been any reports of attacks that point to a werewolf, not until the other night. How long have you been infected?"

 

 

"Years. I was in high school. Look, I've been managing this for a long time. It's not the Plague. It's more like ..." He shrugs a shoulder and winces at the answering fire in his muscles. "Like herpes."

 

 

Sam's mouth twitches at that.

 

 

"I don't know if you remember," Oz continues. "You were pretty out of it a short time later. But we talked about your amulet. I said I'd done a lot of traveling around, tried out a lot of different gods and traditions. I was looking for a cure. I didn't find that, but I learned how to control it. How to keep from changing. But then I got grabbed by some super secret government lab and they tried to find out what makes me tick. They'd call it research; I call it torture. They undid a lot of the work I'd done. Now I do all I can to minimize the risk to other people. The ironic thing is, if you'd come to town a day later, I'd have been out in the desert already, and you'd never have known there was a werewolf in the area."

 

 

Sam turns his face, gazing out a cracked kitchen window, but Oz doesn't think he's registering anything going on outside. A host of subtle emotions flickers across his face. Oz remains quiet. Whether Sam realizes it or not, he's already done his pleading for his life. The speech he just gave, by his standards, was a _Mr. Smith Goes to Washington_-level filibuster.

 

 

Sam turns back to him. "I want the truth," he says. "Have you ever killed a human being?"

 

 

***

 

 

"Depends on your definition of human. I've killed a werewolf in her transformed state." Wording is key here. Keep reminding Sam that he's a human whose wolf self is a temporary state of being. "She was still a human."

 

 

"This was when you were bitten?"

 

 

He's really tempted to spin a story of self-defense, but the real story has its own power. "No. I was in wolf state. I killed another werewolf who was attacking my girlfriend."

 

 

Sam raises a brow. "That's not common."

 

 

"I know. It goes against the pack. I've been fighting my --" he almost says _wolf nature_, but takes a step back, using Sam's word instead -- "infection for a long time."

 

 

"That's not common either. That level of awareness during the wolf state."

 

 

"I guess I'm an interior sort of guy. Not that I'm making a case that I'm special and that's why you shouldn't shoot me. I'd rather we all were thought of as humans with a wolf problem, not as monsters. Veruca was a threat to my girlfriend even when she was human, that was a factor." Oz tries to read Sam's expression, but can't. "How many werewolves have you killed?" He's not sure he wants to know, but he keeps envisioning a necklace of teeth, even though Sam refuses to take trophies. _Could_ he have made one?

 

 

There's a long pause and more of the unreadable. "Just one," Sam finally says, and Oz knows there's a story, and not a pretty one.

 

 

Seconds tick by, and the sweat trickles between Oz's shoulder blades, which are on fire with the position of his arms.

 

 

"It was a woman I cared about." Sam gazes out the cracked window, so covered in dust that it casts a brown haze over everything outside. "She did kill some people. It was brutal -- she tore them apart."

 

 

"Silver bullet?" Oz asks quietly.

 

 

"Yeah. She begged me to, once she realized what she'd done."

 

 

"She'd just found out? Jesus, Sam. Jesus."

 

 

Sam brings the full force of his attention back to Oz, but says nothing.

 

 

"That's like shooting someone who just got handed a cancer diagnosis, just because they ask. She hadn't even had time to process any of it." The look on Sam's face makes it clear this wasn't the smartest approach to take. Oz would probably do well to shut his mouth, but he can't. "There are things you can do. Lock yourself up three nights a month, if nothing else."

 

 

Sam sneers. "Willingly walk into a cage?"

 

 

Oz raises his chin. "I did it for years."

 

 

Sam stares at Oz for a long moment, the change in his expression terrible to watch. "Jesus," Sam says. "Jesus." He turns on his heel and walks out of the cabin into the bleached-out sunlight.

 

 

Oz sees him cross the area that's visible through the brown-streaked window, most probably headed toward the car.

 

_Smart move, Oz._ Now Sam has to kill him to justify what he'd done to this girl in the belief that werewolves always have to die, or else he has to live with himself and his failure to examine the options.

 

 

Or: Sam could do the easy thing. Fire up the engine of his car and leave Oz here. Oz _might_ get out of the plastic cuffs, but he'd never make it back to the van, not after the heatstroke he'd had at the Sunnydale crater. Sam could kill him without having to look him in the eyes the way he'd had to do with the girl.

 

 

Sam doesn't seem like the type -- he's careful, for one thing, and not a coward. But these are extreme circumstances, and his head's been in a pretty extreme place for over a year.

 

 

Oz sighs. "Alice," He says to the empty room. "I wish --" No. you don't do that, even when you're desperate. "I'm sorry."

 

 

***

 

 

Oz closes his eyes, not wanting the filth and rodent's nests to be the last images he sees before he dies. There's nothing he can do about the acrid stench of animal piss steeped into the floorboards.

 

 

He tries to think of Alice. That sweet smile, the faint smell of turpentine after a night of painting, the warmth of her lips against his. The selkie in her painting. It's a damn shame that he hadn't learned about those things before two years went by, that he's only discovered her so he has something to lose. He finds he _does_ want to go on record that life isn't fair. "Fuck the universe," he whispers. It's not random at all; it's cruel.

 

 

His ears pick up the sound of Sam stepping up onto the sagging porch and pushing at the door. Oz opens his eyes. If Sam's going to have the balls to put a silver bullet into him, Oz is going to make him look him in the eyes when he does it.

 

 

Sam's gaze glides away from him as he approaches, then slips around behind the chair.

 

 

"No," Oz says. "You don't get to do that."

 

 

Sam doesn't answer, just bends and slips a blade between Oz's bound wrists and slices through the plastic band. Oz's arms fall heavily to his sides, sending pain tearing through his back and shoulders. Sam folds the blade away and sticks it in his pocket as he comes back around.

 

 

He doesn't look at Oz. "I'll give you a ride to your van."

 

 

"Screw the van," Oz says. "Take me back into town. Alice will be worried."

 

 

Sam shoots him a look then. "You're putting her in danger. You know that."

 

 

Oz shakes his head decisively. "I'm not. I won't. She already knows what I am. But she's never going to see me when I'm not just like this. I've known her two years, and she never knew anything until now, except that I go out hiking every month. She knows because I told her."

 

 

Sam watches him some more, and it's not comfortable. Finally he says, "C'mon. I need to get going."

 

 

Oz doesn't have to be told twice. He settles into the front seat of the Chevy, examining his wrists, which are chafed and cut. He looks away once Sam gets in.

 

 

"What about the van?" Sam asks.

 

 

"I'm sure Alice will bring me out for it. Or one of the guys I work with."

 

 

Sam starts the car and the rumble of the engine sounds unbelievably loud in the quiet of the desert. A raven scolds them and launches itself from its perch.

 

 

"You mind telling me why I'm alive?" Oz asks. "I thought you were going to plug me when I was heading toward the van."

 

 

"That was my plan," Sam admits. "I have somewhere I need to be. But like I said, my research didn't show any signs of an active werewolf around here."

 

 

Oz studies Sam for a moment. "Somewhere you need to be. Maybe a trickster hangout?"

 

 

"A friend has a line on him. There's a ritual. There's a deadline, though, and it's coming up fast."

 

 

"You think you're ready for that?"

 

 

Sam casts him a dark look. "I'm ready."

 

 

"Takes a lot of power to play with time, that's all. I've never met a trickster, but I have run across a vengeance demon. Some things it doesn't pay to screw with. Before you know it, the world goes all monkey's paw."

 

 

A muscle pulses at Sam's jaw. "I didn't give you a ride because I was feeling the need for company."

 

 

Oz takes the hint. He gave his warning, and that's the best he can do. You can't talk someone out of an obsession, especially when he doesn't particularly seem to give a shit if he lives or dies.

 

 

Sam doesn't speak again until they're a mile from town. "I keep an eye out for things like cattle mutilations and especially savage murders. You kill anything bigger than a jackrabbit, I'll know about it, and I'll be back."

 

 

"Not gonna happen."

 

 

Sam falls silent again, until he pulls the car to the curb across from the laundromat. "Thanks for the medical help," The words sound yanked out of him, grudging. "I appreciate it."

 

 

"Sure. Just -- take care of yourself." That'll register about as much as the warning about screwing with a trickster, he's sure.

 

 

Just then he sees the door to the laundromat fly open and Alice is running across the street, and he forgets everything else.

 

 

***

 

 

By the time Oz emerges from Sam's car, Alice is there to pull him into a fierce hug. "Jesus god, Daniel. You're safe, I can't believe you're safe."

 

 

Sam doesn't wait for a farewell or a "Thanks for not killing me" or a death glare from Alice. The Chevy rumbles away from the curb before Alice lets Oz go. "Are you okay?"

 

 

"A little shaky." When has he ever admitted that? "And my wrists are kind of mangled. Otherwise I'm good."

 

 

"Stinky herbs?" she asks.

 

 

"Probably a good idea."

 

 

"I'll close up. There aren't any customers at the moment." For the third day in the row she shutters the laundry, accompanying him back to his apartment. "Where's your van?"

 

 

"It's out there. Sam was going to take me to it, but I didn't want to waste time. I knew you'd be worried."

 

 

"I can take you to pick it up," Alice says.

 

 

"In a while. I'm not going anywhere, it can wait." As simple -- some would say monkish -- as it is, his home is one of the most beautiful sights he's seen in a long time. It's not just the comparison with the neglected and turd-scattered cabin, but the wonder of being alive to see it. And Alice -- everything about her, her glossy curtain of black hair, her long limbs and subtle curves, her boyish/girlish face -- suddenly his appreciation for her very particular _Aliceness_ has blossomed into the revelation that he finds her beautiful.

 

 

"Don't you have some kind of tea?" she asks. "I can put water on to boil and then we can get those cuts cleaned up."

 

 

"The tea's for the big stuff, like busted ribs. Aspirin's enough." Not that he'd want it anyway -- sleep would be a waste of time he could be spending with Alice.

 

 

She fixes him with a look. "You've had busted ribs and haven't come to me?"

 

 

"I didn't really know you before now."

 

 

"I barely knew you, but I've asked you to fix things around the place. I'd have been glad to help you, Daniel."

 

 

"Duly noted," he tells her. "Listen, I think I'd better do more than clean up the wrists. Sam took me to an abandoned cabin that was full of all kinds of animal shit. I'm going to take a fast shower, then we can take care of the first aid." Not to mention he sometimes wakes up from a wolf night with a pretty strong funk.

 

 

"Okay. I want to look at that bullet graze again, too."

 

 

When he emerges in a cloud of steam, he finds Alice has brewed some regular tea and set out a bowl of fresh fruit, all of which she must have brought from her own place. Oz sniffs the air. "Earl Grey."

 

 

"I hope that's all right."

 

 

"More than all right."

 

 

Alice coaxes him to sit and let her work. She _tsk_s over the wounds on his wrists. "That psycho. I knew it from the start."

 

 

"I feel kind of sorry for him," Oz says. "I'd rather have my life than his, wolf and all."

 

 

"I'm amazed you _have_ your life."

 

 

"Me too, to be honest."

 

 

He submits to the routine that's meant to heal him. Waits for the part that will make him feel better. As Alice finishes taping the gauze she's wound around a wrist, she brushes her hands slowly over his as she sits back.

 

 

Oz doesn't let her go so easily. He leans in toward her and steals a kiss.

 

 

***

 

 

He feels that electric tingle again, that little piece of lightning she has inside, and he opens himself to it.

 

 

It's been so long since he let himself be open to another person. After the end of things with Willow, he'd been afraid of hurting someone, of being a man who could be undone by rage and possessiveness. He's not built for empty one-night stands, so he's lived for a long time with another kind of emptiness. Oz tries to stay in the moment, but his mind keeps jittering off to the future, and the past.

 

 

Maybe Alice feels that, because she pulls back a bit, her dark blue eyes fixed on his. "I hate to interrupt where this is heading, but we probably need to stop and have a talk about where this is heading." He draws in a breath to apologize for his distractibility, which has probably prompted this statement, but she goes on. "I don't mean in any epic sense, just what happens next. Because I'd be happy taking this to my bedroom. Which -- I know -- is getting ahead of things. But there's not really a comfortable spot for necking in here, not to mention it's redolent of the stinky herbs right now."

 

 

"'Redolent.' You just pinged my smart woman kink."

 

 

She smiles that smile that drives Oz crazy. "So that's a yes to the change of venue?"

 

 

"That's a yes."

 

 

Alice leads him up the back way to her place, inviting him to settle onto the sofa as she opens a bottle of wine. "It's a little bit early, but pretend it's a mimosa."

 

 

Oz hasn't seen her this jumpy since the thunderstorm. He accepts his wine glass from her, sets it down and takes her hand.

 

 

"Like I said, I know this is getting ahead of things," she says. "But I don't want you to be wondering the whole time -- or me to be obsessing about whether you're wondering."

 

 

"Wondering about what?"

 

 

"Me," she says. "What I'm wearing under the kilt."

 

 

"Oh."

 

 

"There's a lot more variation now on how far people transition. I'm all girl, so there's no surprises."

 

 

"Okay." He feathers the backs of two fingers along her cheek, across her lips. "Feel better?"

 

 

Alice nods.

 

 

"I've got my own disclaimer to make," he tells her. "One ground rule. I'm game for pretty much anything, except for bites and nips. If it feels so good I lose my shit and bite you back, we'll both be howling at the moon. I don't have to be in wolf state to infect you, and that's the last thing I want."

 

 

She nods again, so serious and beautiful.

 

 

"Did that kill the mood?"

 

 

The seriousness gives way to a sudden laugh. "Oh hell no."

 

 

"Good," he says softly. Oz has always been all about not rushing things, Mr. Let's Wait Until We're Doing This For the Right Reasons. But now he brushes a bit of hair from her eyes and murmurs, "What do you say we get to the necking?"

 

 

She sets her wine glass aside and they get to the necking.

 

 

He explores her body a little at a time, with reverence and intent. After all, it's something she was never able to take for granted, so neither should he. (Not that he would have, after his long period of solitude.) He strokes her throat, which he belatedly notices has the lines of a woman's, not the prominent bump of a man's. He leaves a great many kisses there before he moves on.

 

 

Her breasts are another surprise, warm and pliant and _hers_.

 

 

"Oh," he says.

 

 

Alice smiles. "They're homegrown. I do take the Miracle Gro every day. Though they're maybe not completely miraculous."

 

 

"They're perfect," he declares, and sets about demonstrating his point.

 

 

When he finally finds his way farther south, he discovers she not only has all the requisite girl parts, just as promised, but that her retrofitted equipment is just as pretty as what came standard on Willow. It all works pretty much the same, too, with orgasms by a variety of means.

 

 

They stop to catch their breath after a while, tangled together on the big sleigh bed. The great thing about being horizontal with Alice is he can be eye-to-eye with her, if not simultaneously toe-to-toe. Though right now her head is tucked in against his shoulder as he strokes her hair.

 

 

"I was writing a song," he says abruptly.

 

 

"Mmm?"

 

 

"This morning, in the desert, while I was walking back to the van, the beginnings of a song came into my head. It was about you. Then Sam showed up with his pistol, and now it's gone."

 

 

"Fucking visitor from Porlock." Alice rubs her hand over his chest. "Do they ever come back when that happens?"

 

 

"Sometimes they do." Not often, but he won't say that. He snugs his arm around her and kisses her temple, and they both drift into sleep.

 

 

***

 

 

Oz wakes to the radio alarm clock, groaning. He's not sure which thing he notices first, since it all comes in a rush: The bed is piled with blankets and the light is all wrong (in the sense that there isn't any).

 

 

And he's alone.

 

 

He throws off the covers, only to realize it's cold in his apartment. And then to realize he shouldn't _be_ in his apartment.

 

 

"Alice?" he says, but there's no answer. Yeah, she's a fair bit taller than him, but could she really have carried him all the way down here without waking him up? Not a chance. And why the hell would she do that in the first place?

 

 

The song on the radio gives way to a series of ads. Wall-to-wall jewelers, florists, restaurants instead of the usual cellphone plans and carpet steaming services. Oz reaches for the bedside lamp and switches it on, catching sight of an unbandaged, unmarked wrist. He launches himself out of bed and into the bathroom, where he peers at himself in the mirror. The fading scratches from these last wolf nights are gone, along with the bandage Alice had placed over the bullet graze. Turning his back to the mirror and twisting around for a better view, he finds no trace of that injury at all.

 

 

He stumbles back around and notices now that his hair is shaggier than when he went to bed. He splashes cold water over his face, but that doesn't really help the disorientation, which is coming from an external source. He feels wrong, looks wrong. He should be in another place. This place should smell different, with the lingering scent of the herbs hanging in the air.

 

 

The breakfast shift at the diner starts soon, so he showers and reaches for his toothbrush. As he opens the medicine cabinet for the toothpaste, he's confronted by the monthly sunrise-sunset calendar he tapes to the inside of the door, that tracks moon phase as well as exact times of sunup and sundown.

 

 

The header at the top of the page says February 2008.

 

 

He stands there stupidly, his hand frozen in midair. _What?_

 

 

The DJ cues up another song, talks over its intro (a universal DJ trait that Oz universally despises), telling listeners to email their dedications for tomorrow's Valentine's Day show. Yesterday, or quite possibly not-yesterday, the same DJ told his audience to send requests via Twitter or Facebook.

 

 

Tomorrow is Valentine's Day. 2008. He remembers Sam's crude tattoo, and one of the dates. _2-13-08_. Sam had said he'd find the Trickster, "make him take it back." You can take back a year and a half, for six billion people?

 

 

Has Sam gotten his brother back? Will he be happy with the way things turned out, or will he get a taste of the Monkey's Paw Effect? (His wolf believes making wishes on the severed limbs of animals never turns out well.)

 

 

Oz gives his head a hard shake. There's some explanation. The world didn't just jump back 18 months for one guy's wish. He has to push himself through the rest of his morning routine, then lets himself out of his apartment and walks across to the diner.

 

 

As he reaches the sidewalk the door opens and Alice emerges with a tall cup of coffee. She's wearing a thick Aran sweater with high neck, with her miniskirt, leggings and cowboy boots. Oz remembers abruptly that she used to wear turtlenecks all the time, but it's been a while since that was true. He doesn't even remember noticing when that changed.

 

 

She smiles at him, but it's the generic friendly one he used to get. Not the sweet one that just kills him -- and _that_ kills him.

 

 

"Hey, Alice," he says.

 

 

"Hi, Daniel." She regards him for a moment, registering the intensity of his greeting. "Is there anything up with your apartment?"

 

 

"Uh, no. I just -- I just wanted to say hey."

 

 

The smile flickers more into something he recognizes, but only for a microsecond.

 

 

"See you on wash day, then."

 

 

"Sure." He watches her cross to the laundromat, then turns to walk into the diner.

 

 

The bell dings overhead as he steps in, and Eduardo eyes him. "Hey, man. You okay?"

 

 

"Not even remotely okay," Oz says, and trudges on back to the kitchen.

 

 

***

 

 

Rey, the owner, follows Oz to tell him if he's got something communicable to get the hell out of his kitchen.

 

 

"No," Oz says. "I'm just kind of depressed and a little hungover. Nothing I can spread."

 

 

"I dunno," says Rey. "You're spreading it to me." He thumps Oz on the shoulder to let him know it's a joke, and Oz nods but doesn't manage even a ghost of a smile. Rey goes for the shoulder again, squeezing it this time. "You need anything?"

 

 

"Nah." Nothing Rey can give him, anyway. He needs not to have had a temporal rug pulled out from under him. Needs to be waking up with Alice next to him, with slow, coffee-flavored kisses and sleepy murmurs. "I'm good," he lies. "I'd better get started."

 

 

He plunges his forearms in hot water, scrubbing the crusted oatmeal off the big pot. Oz usually likes his job -- hot water, repetitive motions that leave his mind free for thoughts or meditation or scraps of music. But his thoughts today are not ones he wants to be left alone with. He listens to the cook talk with Rey -- a little sports, a little politics (How about that Bill Richardson?), plans for Valentine's Day evening, the romantic gestures designed to open the gateway to epic sex.

 

_I can't do this again._

 

 

It should be enough to do this once, to be the unwilling guardian of a reality that no one else shares. Or wants to share. Xander and Dawn both knew that what Oz held was the true history of the pre-Dawn Scoobies, but they didn't want it. He can't blame Dawn for that, or for her existential wig. He'd had one himself, and he wasn't even facing the erasure of the first fourteen years of his life.

 

 

Oz had sensed Xander flirting with the idea of exploring the truth, then choosing the lie. Not that Oz could blame him either. He'd found the girl for him, and it was the elaborate fiction that had shaped who she was. And he lives in Buffy's world, which requires a sister in the cast.

 

 

Oz wonders where he can settle now. He needs another place with true wilderness close by, where a wolf can thrive without putting people at risk. Oz needs a place where he can -- well, he doubts he'll thrive anywhere after this loss, but he needs a job he can leave for three days a month, and a modest home that's private.

 

 

He's had all that here, and it pisses him off to know it's slipping away. Life's Unfair, verse 71, then take it to the bridge.

 

 

Once the lunch rush clears out, Rey shows Oz a bottle and jerks his head toward the dining room. He waves Oz into the corner booth then installs himself across the table and pours a couple of shots of Cuervo.

 

 

"Feel like talking about it?" Rey asks.

 

 

"Not so much," Oz says.

 

 

"Feel like drinking about it?"

 

 

"Without a doubt," he answers, and knocks back his drink.

 

 

"Hair of the dog that bit you," Rey says. He pours them each another.

 

_Hair of the wolf that bit me._ He'd almost forgotten lying about being hungover.

 

 

Oz has a few more, but the tequila only sinks him farther into depression.

 

 

"Maybe you ought to get some rest," Rey suggests. "Go on home and sleep it off."

 

 

"Yeah," he says. "Maybe." What he does instead is pack.

 

 

***

 

 

It doesn't take long to gather up the last two years of his life. He piles his books in a liquor store box, fills another with some non-perishables from his cupboard and medicine cabinet, plus his jars of herbs, padding them with dish towels and t-shirts. He settles those boxes and his first aid kit into the van, remembering Alice's remark when she'd first seen the kit. _That's a pretty damn big first aid kit for a little shaver like you._

 

 

Oz wonders if he should pause and get a little drunker.

 

 

No. Leave now. Rip off the Band-Aid.

 

 

The idea that this is a Band-Aid level hurt makes Oz emit an unamused laugh. He pulls his duffel out of the closet, filling it with folded t-shirts, jeans and underwear. He grabs his guitar case, takes one last look around and leaves.

 

 

It occurs to him that he needs to give Alice notice and hand back his key. Oz trudges on past the van and enters the laundromat. It's fairly quiet, a couple of dryers running but no one around except Alice.

 

 

He stands in the open doorway a moment and watches her take her X-Acto to a magazine page. She glances up at the gust of cold air, giving him a smile before returning her attention to her work.

 

 

The fluorescent lights catch the blue cast to her hair color. He watches the highlights move as she does, takes in the swing of her glossy hair. Intent on creating something -- maybe one of the paintings Oz has already seen.

 

 

It occurs to Oz that he's been wrong to see a parallel with what happened with Xander and Dawn. What Oz is holding in this case is not a true history that no one else shares. It's a possible future. If he walks away, that possibility crumbles. He remains alone, more closed off than before. Alice remains alone.

 

 

But how can he bear hanging around for the next seventeen months? And if Sam doesn't come through Lone Pine to provide the catalyst, will anything happen at all?

 

 

Oz heaves a sigh and trudges toward Alice's desk. Rip off the metaphorically inadequate Band-Aid. But before he makes it halfway across the room, he finds himself veering to the right, opening the porthole on one of the front loaders. He unpacks the duffel into the machine, fumbles for quarters and loads them into the coin slots. Just like any of the times he's brought in his laundry.

 

 

The machine balks at taking his quarters, and he keeps trying to shove the slider bar home, muttering curses.

 

 

"Daniel." Alice is standing at his elbow. "Let me see what's wrong." After a quick examination, she plucks one of the quarters out of the tray. "Canadian," she informs him, and replaces it with another quarter, sliding the coins into the machine, and the hiss of rushing water signals success.

 

 

"Oh. Thanks." She's standing so close to him, and it makes him want to kiss her. It makes him want to cry. He stands there stupidly instead, saying nothing, doing nothing.

 

 

Alice peers at him closely. "Are you all right?"

 

 

"I am a little drunk," he tells her.

 

 

She offers a small smile. "I noticed that. Are you okay?"

 

 

"I'm trying to decide."

 

 

Nodding, she says, "Doing laundry is a good activity for that. Folding clean smelling, warm clothes. Though you might want to put some soap in there before you get too far into the cycle."

 

 

"Oh. Oh shit." He pats his pockets for more quarters, but Alice puts up a hand.

 

 

"I'll get it. My treat." She gets some powder from the economy-sized box she uses for the drop-off laundry loads, pours it into the chute at the top of the machine. White suds begin to swirl through the water.

 

 

"Thanks," Oz says.

 

 

Alice steps back, neatly dodging his guitar case in her red cowboy boots. "You brought your guitar."

 

 

"I was in the mood to play," he lies.

 

 

"It'll be nice to listen to while I fold."

 

 

She likes "I Still Miss Someone" this time around, too. Oz plays until his washer stops, then transfers his clothes to a dryer. He rolls the laundry cart back to the folding table and catches the faintest scent as Alice moves past him.

 

 

"Turpentine," he says abruptly.

 

 

"Oh hell," Alice says. "I thought I scrubbed that off."

 

 

"It's barely noticeable," he assures her. "I just happen to have a freakishly acute sense of smell."

 

 

"I was painting last night."

 

 

"Painting painting. Not wall painting."

 

 

"Exactly. Oils. Mixed media, to be more exact."

 

 

This time he'll say something more intelligent. Something perceptive and interesting and --

 

 

"Cool." Yeah, just like that, dumbass. "I'd like to see some someday."

 

 

She offers him a smile that holds a hint of the sweetness he'd been missing. "Maybe," she says. "It's been a long time since anyone's seen them but me."

 

 

"Whatever you're comfortable with. Just so you know I'm interested." He's got time.

 

 

They've got time.

 

 

***

 

 

Epilogue:

 

 

Oz sits in the window of the laundromat, playing the guitar. It's early Sunday; the only others in the place are Alice and a bored man reading a paper in the back. Oz picks haltingly through a tune he's been working on, a process of false starts and a maddening amount of repetition. He's been at this a few days, but Alice is patient with the process, because she has her own. She'll get her three-day break from the song starting tomorrow, and maybe the creative logjam will break up while he's in the desert.

 

 

The door opens, letting in the July heat and a smell that cuts through his creative tail-chasing.

 

 

Blood. Lots of it. And it's not all human. And not exactly animal, either.

 

 

Oz had hoped never to see Sam again, hoped the reprieve he'd gotten from the Trickster would have set him on a different path. He looks up at the newcomer and is startled not to see Sam but another man, shorter, less shaggy, but with a definite kinship to Sam -- Oz's wolf can sense it. He has a duffel slung over his shoulder -- if not the same one Oz saw in that time-that-wasn't, it's identical. Depositing the bag on one washer, he begins stuffing his laundry in a couple of machines. The clothes are wadded into tight bundles that don't reveal any of the blood Oz knows must be soaking through some of the pieces. The man wipes his hands on a dark tee before flipping the washer doors shut and heading for the change machine, where he feeds in a bill and gets a cascade of quarters.

 

 

Oz notices the stranger's bowlegged walk as he returns to the machines, and the stranger notices his scrutiny, giving him a challenging stare. Oz pulls his attention away and back to his guitar, as if he'd just been gazing at nothing in particular. He picks an old Doc Watson tune as his mind races.

 

_Where is Sam? Is he here to take care of unfinished business? Is he here at all?_ He wonders if maybe Sam's confrontation with the Trickster set them on a hugely different course. Maybe Sam paid for challenging the Trickster and it's his brother who's now on his own.

 

 

Oz steals glances at the man as he idly reads over the flyers and business cards tacked to the bulletin board, then drifts over to the big signboard with the laundromat rules posted on it, which Alice made by hand, painted and collaged into a practical work of art.

 

 

Another blast of hot air gusts into the room, and Oz turns his attention to the newcomer.

 

 

Sam, looking a helluva lot less battered than he had in the time-that-wasn't, a soda bottle in each hand.

 

 

Oz isn't sure whether to be relieved or wary. He decides on a mixture. (His wolf goes for the uncomplicated and chooses wary.)

 

 

Sam stops just inside the door, blinking. He takes in the interior of the laundromat, vastly different from the way it had looked that first time he'd seen it. The institutional green of the walls above the machines has been replaced with a plum color. Framed prints of several of Alice's paintings hang over the washers and dryers.

 

 

The window where Oz sits is different too, the deep ledge extended outward as a small stage big enough for one or two musicians.

 

 

Sam's gaze lands on Oz, but only for a heartbeat before the other man walks over.

 

 

"Are you gonna hand one of those over, or have you taken up two-fisted drinking?"

 

 

Sam kind of looks like he wants to. Instead he offers one of the Cokes. "Sorry, Dean."

 

 

"What's the matter?"

 

 

"This place has changed."

 

 

"You've been here before?" Dean twists off the cap, slugs down a good third of the bottle. "Places change."

 

 

"This one --" Sam cuts himself off, but Oz knows what he wanted to say. _This one shouldn't._

 

 

Before Sam can regain his balance, Oz says, "Hey, Sam."

 

 

Sam's head snaps around to take Oz in and his jaw drops.

 

 

Rising, Oz sets his guitar aside and steps down from the platform. He offers his hand to Dean. "I'm Daniel. I bet you're Dean."

 

 

"You two know each other," Dean says, and it's half a question.

 

 

"Uh, yeah. Yeah," Sam stammers. "From Stanford. So you're uh, you're here now."

 

 

Oz nods. "My wife owns this place." He extends an inviting gesture toward her. "Alice, come meet some people."

 

 

She sets down the sketchpad she's been bent over all morning and comes to them. "What, more Scoobies?"

 

 

Oz laughs. "Sort of, but no. This is Sam -- uh, sorry --"

 

 

"Winchester," Sam offers, and Oz realizes he's never known his last name.

 

 

"And his brother Dean. My wife Alice."

 

 

Alice's bracelets clack as she shakes their hands. "Good to meet you."

 

 

"Wow," says Sam. "That's a big change since last time I saw you."

 

 

Dean flicks a quick look toward Alice at the words "big change," but he says nothing.

 

 

Sam goes on. "How, uh, long have you been married?"

 

 

"Since November." He slips his arm around her waist.

 

 

"You made some changes around here," Sam says, still on stammer mode.

 

 

"You've been before?" she asks. She regards him as if she ought to remember him; she does recall a big percentage of the yearly vacationers.

 

 

"A while back. Hiking trip. Evil-smelling laundry."

 

 

Alice smiles. "We do get a lot of that. Yeah, we made a few changes. Daniel started bringing in his guitar, and we decided to do a coffee house kind of thing every now and then, which turned into three times a week, and he talked me into putting some of my work up."

 

 

Sam gestures at the prints. "These are yours. They're amazing."

 

 

"Thank you."

 

 

"There's a lot more at a gallery up in Mammoth Lakes," Oz says. "You should get up there if you can." As soon as possible, his wolf agrees.

 

 

"We're having the coffee house tonight," Alice says. "If you're still around after 7:00, you should come by. No machines running, just music." They throw tablecloths over the folding tables and bring in stools and change the lighting. It makes a world of difference.

 

 

Oz catches Sam's eye. "It's a good time to catch me playing. I'll be out of town for a few days starting tomorrow."

 

 

A flicker of expression tells Oz that Sam has registered the significance of that remark, and the timing of his plans. "I wish we could, man. We're headed up to South Dakota on some business."

 

 

Dean's own quickly-smothered surprise tells Oz this wasn't in the original plan, but they're clearly a team; Dean swiftly adjusts. "Yeah. One gig after the other. Which is good, I guess."

 

 

"We're going to grab some lunch across the street while our laundry's going, then we're out of here," Sam adds.

 

 

"How's the pie over there?" Dean asks.

 

 

"It's really good," Alice says. "The cherry and the sour cream apple are the best, but you can't go wrong with any of it."

 

 

"They do a really good _tres leches_ cake too," Oz says.

 

 

"Nah, I'm all about the pie," Dean says. They take their polite leave, but only after Oz and Sam exchange a significant look.

 

 

Oz watches them cross the street. Something feels vaguely off about Sam, but there's something else that feels much more settled than in the time-that-wasn't. Oz is glad Sam found his brother.

 

 

"What was that look about?" Alice asks him.

 

 

He flickers a smile. "There was a look?" He's teasing, not concealing. There's not much he's hidden from her, just the rewind-time. He doesn't know how he can tell it.

 

 

"Between you and Sam. It was definitely a look."

 

 

"It was a truce," Oz says.

 

 

That's all it is, he knows that. It stays in force for as long as Oz keeps his wolf in check.

 

 

But that's all he's going to need.


End file.
